


Diving in the dark

by J_Antebellum



Category: Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:08:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 51,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28092930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/J_Antebellum/pseuds/J_Antebellum
Summary: In 2017, Strike and Robin have a successful detectives agency, two children and... they're broken-up. How can they get back to what they were?
Relationships: Robin Ellacott/Cormoran Strike
Comments: 40
Kudos: 22





	1. Detective Aiden

**Chapter 1:**

_October 7 th, 2017._

The first rainstorms of the month had dominated most of the week, and on Saturday Strike woke up restless and grumpy, which wasn't really abnormal. In the about ten years of managing an agency of private investigation, the last five alongside his partner, Robin Ellacott, who in all books was written as co-owner, their agency had risen enormously. They got about three or four big cases every year that made it to the newspapers, and the rest of the time the cases were smaller ones, some pretty much insignificant, but still the loads of work were enormous and very often Strike didn't get to sleep much or, when he slept, get a very restful sleep. Even less, since...

“Daddy, wakey-wakey!” his eldest little storm came running and jumped on the bed just when Strike was trying to ignore his alarm. He groaned as his ribs were squashed and against his own will, couldn't help the smile that appeared with a mind of its own in his face when the little person kissed all over his face, cupping it with plump, soft and warm little hands. “Good morning!”

“Morning, sweetheart,” Strike opened his eyes and his arms were already around his companion with fatherly instinct. “Did you sleep well?”

“Yes! You?”

“Yeah,” Strike nodded. “Where's your brother, did you wake him up yet?”

“I'm not supposed to wake the baby up.” Two big blue-grey eyes looked at him with innocence, framed by big freckled cheeks and falling light-brown thick curls.

“That's right. Good girl. Give Daddy his leg, will you? And we'll go get breakfast.”

Obediently, the little girl jumped off the bed, got the brand new leg prosthesis of her father, and observed him as he groaned, sitting up and putting on his prosthesis just like every morning. She had grown so used to the action that she didn't even blink an eye.

“Will we go to Mummy's birthday party tonight?” asked the girl.

“Sure,” replied Strike as she took his big hand in her tiny one and guided him outside his bedroom and into the big flat in the top floor of the building of Golden Square that had been occupied by Sony until a year prior.

“Even when it's not her turn to be with us?”

“Yeah,” Strike nodded, being guided to the nursery by routine. “Special events don't count. Everybody comes.”

“How old is Mummy getting?” asked the girl standing by a crib as Strike leaned over it to check on the sleeping boy, curled into a corner with dark curls pointing all directions. Strike decided not to bother him and they went to the kitchen. He answered on the way there.

“Thirty-three.”

“And you?”

“Forty-three next month,” Strike replied again, busying himself preparing a bowl of cereal for his daughter and putting the kettle on. He was used to his daughter's relentless questions.

“Is your birthday next month?” the girl asked with a tone of surprise.

“Yeah.”

“Which day?”

“The twenty-third. Thursday.”

“Will we celebrate it with Mummy?”

“Probably. But it'll have to wait for the weekend. You've got school and we've got work on Thursdays. Like today, we're celebrating Mummy's birthday, but it's not until Monday.”

“Do we give her presents again on Monday?”

“You can give her a drawing and a good kiss on Monday if you want.”

“Daddy.”

“Yes, poppet?”

“What are you giving Mummy for her birthday?”

“I've bought her a jumper and a bottle of good wine, the one she likes.”

“Will you give her a good kiss too?” Her hopeful tone didn't go unnoticed to Strike, who sighed, putting her bowl in front of her on the table by which she sat, and filling his mug with tea.

“I will give her a kiss on the cheek.”

“Not those. I mean an adults kiss! On the mouth! Like you used to!”

“Aiden,” Strike sat by her side and faced her, “sweetie, you know Mummy and I don't give each other adult kisses anymore. Those are for people who are in love and in a serious romantic relationship, but your mother and I are just the best of friends now, and nothing else. The best of friends only kiss on the cheek.”

Aiden pouted and pushed her bowl away, looking down. Strike frowned lightly. Robin and him and been very worried, over a year before when they had decided to separate, about how Aiden would take it. Bruno, with only nine months of age, wouldn't remember a time in which they were together, but Aiden had been two and with a very privileged memory and observation skills, like her parents. They had been cheesy and romantic when Aiden was so very little, and then one day, suddenly for her, they wouldn't even live in the same house anymore. Robin had found her a therapist to talk to, but Aiden, being so much like Strike, had spent the entire hour in silence and had, once at home, sworn to never speak to neither of them if they made her go again. Robin, who by then had already gotten a degree in Psychology with the Open University and another on Criminology, had then handled things herself, but Aiden hadn't been interested on what she called 'empty words' so now, they dealt with it as they went.

“I want you and Mummy to be together again. I miss home,” Aiden said with a tearful voice. “I wanna go home.”

Strike felt his own chest swell with sadness and he took his daughter's little hand and pulled, so she'd come to his arms, climbing on his lap and letting him envelop her.

“I miss home too. I miss Mummy, I miss everything we had, every single day. It makes me so sad too, Aiden.”

“Then why don't you tell her? Is it because you fought?” she asked innocently with a sad voice. “I'm sure you can forgive each other, just say you're sorry.”

“Baby, we're not angry at each other,” Strike explained, kissing the top of her curly head. “Your Mummy and I will always love each other very much. We will always care about each other so much, and do everything in our power for each other. We're still partners, in some way, and we're forever a team, we have each other's backs.”

“Then live together again?”

“We can't. Sometimes, love isn't enough, Aiden. Sometimes, it doesn't matter how much you care about someone, or how much they care about you, because being together wouldn't be good for each other. When your Mummy and I were together, we had some good times and Bruno and you came around, and we were so happy. We felt so blessed, we had the life we had always wanted. But when we saw ourselves as grown-up adults with two children, we realized we weren't as good of a match as we thought. I love football, Mummy doesn't, Mummy loves going out, I don't so much, we had different views of how the house should be organized, how we wanted to do life as a family... in the end, we were always fighting, don't you remember? We fought for the duties the other didn't do, for work, we brought work home all the time, we fought for the things we should or shouldn't buy you, we fought for which colour to paint rooms, which napkins to buy at the supermarket, who should take you to school, who took care of you and Bruno when we weren't around... when we started dating, everything was fluid, we seemed to read each other's minds, we hardly needed words. We fit so well, we both went in the same direction. But people change, it's nobody's fault, and over the years we changed and stopped fitting so well. Your mother and I just come from very different worlds, Poppet... she's ten years younger, from another time, raised in a farm with many siblings and a huge, loving family... and I'm a beach boy turned city boy, with very different childhood. So as much as we're the best of friends and as hard as we care for each other, we're not good to live together. We're like... like chocolate and juice. They're both great, aren't they? But together, they ruin it.”

Aiden pulled apart and frowned at him.

“Adults make everything so complicated,” she pouted. Strike smiled at her.

“Why's that?”

“Because if you love each other so much, then you shouldn't care about the colour of napkins. What matters is that you stick together.”

Strike looked at her baffled, but she simply took her bowl of cereal, and started eating. An hour later, while Aiden sang to herself and made drawings sitting on a cushion on the rug and supporting on the coffee table, Strike had Bruno, who was close to twenty-one months old, sitting on a high chair eating some fruit with his hands while Strike observed to make sure he wouldn't stick a piece of banana in his throat and asphyxiate. He felt his phone buzzing in his pocket and, grabbing it, he saw a photograph of a grinning Robin holding two little babies between her arms and the name 'Ellacott' came on screen. Listening to Aiden humming just outside the kitchen in which he was, he picked up the phone.

“Ellacott,” he smiled with the familiar salute.

“Strike,” he could hear the smile in Robin's voice. “How's it going?”

“All good, birthday girl. Just keeping an eye on Bruno while he eats fruit and gets kiwi up to his curls.”

“Aw, such a Strike! And how's our sweet girl?”

“I think you may hear her, wait,” Strike held the phone up. “She's singing _Frozen_ songs.”

“Oh, I hear it! Oh, she's amazing,” Robin was already drooling, he could tell.

“She's drawing in the living room. Don't worry, I'll bring them over for your birthday celebrations, they're excited about it.”

“I didn't doubt you,” said Robin.

They kept a quite liberal custody of the kids. Normally, they'd have it a week each. It wasn't problematic, because since they worked together and Aiden always hung out in the office with her brother when she wasn't in school, the only thing that changed was who took them home and brought them back to the office each day. Robin didn't live too far anyway. On special occasions, they'd agree on spending the day the four together, or at least bring the children, both were invited to each other's flats any time they wished to come, and occasionally, if one of them was really missing them or wanted to bring them somewhere and couldn't change the fact that the day fell into the other's time with the kids, they'd do an exchange of days. For example, a couple weeks previously Strike had wanted to bring the kids to an event for children in St. Mawes, when it was Robin's turn to have them, and she had acceded in exchange for a day more with them when they came back. Other times, they didn't even ask for anything in exchange; what mattered was that the children were happy.

“So if you're not calling to make sure I dress the kids up all handsomely and fill your arse with presents, what's the occasion?” Robin snorted a laugh.

“Actually... I wanted to ask if it'd be all right to introduce the children to someone tonight,” she asked hesitantly. Strike frowned and Bruno salivated over a piece of orange.

“Robin, since when do we ask each other permission about who the kids meet?”

“I'm not talking about any someone, Cormoran,” Robin clarified. “I mean...” she was nervous now. “I've been dating, and he would like to meet them, and I was thinking perhaps it'd be a good thing. Have them become friends now, so they're more open to... him hanging with us, sometimes. If you approve.”

Strike felt like throwing up. Robin was seeing someone else? And she wanted for him to hang with them three? What was this going to be, them forming their own perfect family? What about Strike? What about what them four were together? Of course he didn't approve. Not just all of that, but the sole idea of having a man he didn't know perfectly well getting anywhere near his little children made him feel nauseous and sick. What if it was another Jeff Whittaker? Whittaker had murdered his mother and brother, what would this guy do? What if Aiden looked at the guy with the same terror Lucy looked at every man their mother had dated?

“Corm?” Robin asked again, doubtful. “Are you still there?”

He knew he couldn't say no, however. If he said no, everyone would assume it was jealousy -and of course he was jealous and like a lion, he wanted Robin for himself, he wanted to keep hoping they'd be together- and he'd be the ogre who doesn't let his ex move on and find happiness with someone else. And Strike wanted for Robin to be happy.

“I'm here, sorry,” said Strike. “I thought Bruno was choking, false alarm. Uh... yeah, sure, is he coming today?”

“Oh, yeah, that was the plan. I can cancel if you'd rather he didn't, though.”

“Bring him,” Strike nodded for himself, trying to gulp the knot that had suddenly formed in his throat. “I want to meet him, if he's going to be anywhere near the kids, all right?”

“Of course, sure.”

As soon as the phone call was over, Strike took Bruno in his arms and went to Aiden. He sat them both on the sofa and sat on the coffee table, directly in front of them.

“Listen,” said Strike, “Mummy's got a new friend she wants to introduce you to tonight. I want you to keep your eyes open and tell me everything you think of this man, all right?”

“Who is he? How is he?” asked Aiden, holding her brother's hand.

“I don't know. But if he does anything you dislike, or makes you feel uncomfortable, if he grabs any of you, or says anything you dislike, you come running straight to me, okay baby girl?”

“Okay.”

Strike sighed to himself. The day was going to be hard to survive.


	2. Missing home

**Chapter 2:**

Strike dressed himself with a suit without a tie, put a little dress on Aiden, and put a shirt and nice trousers on Bruno, and Aiden complained she couldn't wear her Sponge Bob t-shirt for the entire drive from the 25 Golden Square to the Holborn flat where Robin lived.

“For the love of God, Denie,” said Strike, his voice rising over the hammering of the rain against the old second-hand BMW's crystals as he turned in a red light to look at his eldest child. “I'll let you wear the Sponge Bob tee tomorrow all day if you want, but Mummy really loves how that dress looks on you, can we give her the joy of seeing you in it for her birthday?”

Aiden seemed to think about it for a moment and then, she nodded. Since her seat was turned around, Strike could see her on the little mirror that hung from the back-seat, in front of her.

“This dress is nice enough,” Aiden's little voice added. Strike nodded.

“Thank you, love. How's it going back there, Bruno?” his son squealed in response. Bruno wasn't talking much, but they weren't getting anxious about it. They knew Aiden, talking full short sentences before the eighteen months of age, had been an abnormality. “Great.”

Strike turned again and saw the light go green, so he hit the pedal and the car moved again. Turning a corner, they appeared at Southampton Place. Robin owned a loft that was the top two floors of one of the little flats. They made good money with the agency, and she had been able to afford it without worries. The entire place was reformed, and the kids loved it. Strike had to admit, she had gained a very spacious place (since it had originally been two flats that someone had put together as a big loft) and it was quite nice. However, as he entered the tiny lift with his son sitting against his hip and his daughter's hand firmly held in his, he was feeling incredibly anxious.

He had been looking forward to this day for weeks, he had Robin's present wrapped-up inside a plastic bag hanging from his arm, he should be happy and excited, but the knowledge that Robin had moved on with someone else hammered in his chest and made him feel like he could cry. He knew any smiles would look fake. He wasn't happy, not in the slightest. He was heartbroken, as he had always, in some part of himself, assumed their break-up would only be temporary and now he faced the real possibility of losing her forever and growing up alone, seeing her move on with Mr Perfect. He hadn't even slept with another girl since their break-up, thirteen months previously. And then he was worried. Worried he'd be a brat, worried he wouldn't treat her right, worried he'd be bad for his children, and worried he'd be absolutely perfect and he'd lose Robin for real.

“There you are!” Robin grinned, already crutching two seconds after opening the door and holding her arms open for her daughter to jump into her arms.

“Mummy, mummy!” Aiden and Bruno yelled at once, the latter stretching towards his mother, who took him with one arm and covered them both with kisses.

“Happy birthday,” Aiden said. “I made you a drawing, Daddy has it.”

“I kept it rolled inside the bag,” Strike said lifting the plastic bag as Robin looked at him. “Happy birthday.”

“Thank you,” Robin grinned again, and looked at their children. “You two just keep growing! You look so beautiful, the both of you, I'm so happy!” she kissed them again and put them on the floor. “Denie darling, why don't you walk with Bruney inside? Grandma and Grandpa are there.”

“Yay! Come on Brun!” Aiden took her brother's hand and slowly, they walked inside. Robin and Strike contemplated them for a moment, happily, and then Robin looked up at Strike.

“What's up with you? You're looking grim,” Robin commented. Strike cursed her ability -lost when they had separated, magically recovered since- of reading him with just looking at him.

“Oh, nothing. Aiden had a bit of a sad moment this morning, again about us not being together...” Strike found the excuse quickly. Robin frowned, worried. “I dealt with it and she's fine now, you saw her. I guess it just made me sad.”

“My poor angel,” Robin murmured. She then looked at Strike and smiled sadly. “You can relax, you know? He's not here.”

“Who?”

“My boyfriend,” Robin said lowering her voice. “No one knows he exists, and he's not here. I told him it was better he wouldn't come.” Strike did his best to dissimulate his cheerfulness at the news.

“Why? I told you it was fine.”

“I know you only said it to be nice,” said Robin. “You don't like the idea of strangers around your children, and I get it. I know the childhood you had, and even I, who didn't have it like that, wouldn't be happy if my children were playing with a girlfriend of yours I didn't know one day. So I've thought... perhaps we should go for a drink first, just he, you and I. You meet him, decide if you really don't mind him being around the kids, then they can meet him. No hurry.”

Strike couldn't help feeling so relieved. That made so much sense and it was something he could agree with, and he was grateful Robin knew him so well. Better than anyone. So he confessed.

“I was dying in anxiousness thinking of...” Strike bit his lip. “I don't want Aiden to ever have the expression in her face Lucy had when one of Mum's boyfriends came around.” Robin nodded.

“Me neither,” she stretched a hand towards him. “I've got Doom Bar.” Strike grinned, taking her hand.

“I've got presents.”

Inside, they joined Robin's parents, her eldest brother Stephen with his wife Jenny and their daughter, who was just months older than Aiden, Lucy and Greg, their teenager sons at a friend's house so they wouldn't be bored, their work employees and friends, Vanessa Ekwensi, Eric and April Wardle, Robin's ex-flatmate and friend the actress Estella McLowen, and Nick, Ilsa and their own children. So the house was pretty crowded, but with the children already playing upstairs in Aiden's bedroom, the adults sat around the coffee table in the living room, some on the sofas and armchairs and others comfortably sat on the carpeted, rug-covered floor. The house smelled of lunch cooking in the oven.

Nick and Ilsa had finally managed to have a child, and it had happened, miraculously, when they had stopped worrying and obsessing about it. Ilsa had gotten pregnant late in 2012, and baby Sophie Herbert had arrived in the end of the summer of 2013, being now four years old. Then, Nick and Ilsa had decided to adopt, and they had had another girl, Eowen, from an orphanage in south England, in 2014. Just in the end of 2015, their unexpected surprise, Kenwyn Cormoran, had arrived, and now they were three.

While they had drinks, Robin had opened her presents and now contemplated, with a frown, yet another drawing of the four of them -Cormoran, Robin, Aiden and Bruno- happily smiling and holding hands. Aiden rarely drew anything different.

“That looks like she's protesting for the separation in her own way,” Vanessa commented, seeing Robin's frustration. “Why don't you take it to a child psychologist?”

“Because her surname may be Ellacott-Strike, but she's definitely 99% Strike,” said Robin, sighing. “She hates therapists and all else.”

“Every time we insinuate it, she holds her breath until we stop talking about it. No kidding, last time she got purple,” added Strike. The guests looked amused more than worried.

“That does sound like a Strike,” Ilsa teased, winking at her childhood best friend.

“But what are we going to do? She cannot continue like this the rest of her life, it's been over a year, she has to move on,” Robin said anxiously.

“Robin, darling, you're the psychologist,” said her father tenderly. “Although if I were you, I wouldn't worry much. She's just a toddler. In a few years, she won't remember her parents ever having been together.” The mere thought gave Strike a knot in the stomach.

Strike decided to go check on the kids while the food was settled on the table, as they had had lunch before the adults, and he climbed the stairs to the storey above, and opened a door from which it hung a board saying 'Aiden Leda' in pink and purple colours. He smiled right away, seeing Aiden, Eowen, Sophie and Aiden and Bruno's cousin Samantha 'Sammy' Ellacott, along with Kenwyn and Bruno, all playing Lego peacefully on the rug, building a castle together.

“That's super cool!” Strike complimented. All the girls were one four and the others three years old, and the boys were both one, so the girls had a maternal aptitude over them and helped them put blocks together. “Are you all having fun?”

There was a general choir of affirmation as a reply.

“Daddy, do we have more blocks?” Aiden asked then.

“Uhm... I think we left the other box at my flat,” Strike replied cautiously. “But you have many pens here to do colouring, and other toys. There's enough to play for hours, darling.” Aiden sighed sadly, and nodded.

There was music downstairs and they were enjoying lunch and talking about this and that while eating. Strike joined in the table and attacked his plate with hunger, looking at Robin and observing how happy and cheerful she looked. He was happy she was so relaxed and having such a good time. Nick, sitting next to Strike, elbowed him lightly.

“Are the girls putting make-up on our sons yet?” he asked with a smirk. Strike snorted a laugh.

“No, they're mothering them,” replied Strike.

“We're going to have to have more sons to balance things,” his best friend joked.

“Well, speak for yourself, I won't be having more kids,” Strike murmured.

“Shame...”

“So how long are you staying?” Lucy asked Michael and Linda Ellacott over the table.

“We're leaving tomorrow night,” Linda replied. “Could only stay for a bit, since there's so much to do at the farm, and my brother can't with it all, even with the employees.”

“Which reminds me,” Robin remembered suddenly. “Cormoran, would you mind the kids stay here tonight and you can have them from Friday night in compensation? I was hoping, since my parents can't stay longer, that they could stay and spend some time together, since they hardly see each other...”

Strike looked at her. She looked guilty, having taken two days, counting the next, that really corresponded to him, but he was already nodding. He had no parents to offer the children, he wanted for them to spend as much time as possible with the only grandparents they had alive.

“No problem, but I'll pick them up Saturday night. You're just asking for one day, no need to give me two.” Strike wasn't going to count today, as he was there as well, even if they were at Robin's doing Robin's plans. The woman looked grateful at him and smiled.

“Thank you, you're such a saint.”

“Bah,” Strike shrugged. “They will probably appreciate it anyway, they'll be tired after playing so much and thankful to be able to just nod off.”

After dinner, Strike went to the toilet but, since it was busy, he decided to go to Robin's en-suite bathroom upstairs, encouraged by Robin herself. He entered the bedroom cautiously, even though he had permission to be there. It felt weird. The room was neatly cleaned, and so was the bathroom, and had a touch of Robin. Strike had missed how her perfume filled the house the way it had always done and now it didn't anymore. Before separating, they had lived together in his flat, but since the flat had been Strike's before Robin even came to live there -back when he bought it, she had been sharing a flat with Estella in Earl's Court- once they separated, Robin had insisted she'd be the one to move out, so Strike had never used this bedroom. Coming out of the bathroom, Strike's eyes trailed around her bedroom and stopped on the framed photograph on the night stand. He sat on the verge of the bed and took the photograph between his hands, smiling sadly. It was the first family photograph they had taken with Bruno, when Robin and the baby had come home, and they were sitting against the headboard of the bed, in their pyjamas, with year-and-a-half Aiden holding newborn Bruno while she sat between her parents, Strike's arm around Robin, her lips against his cheek, and they had all looked so happy. It had been a happy day that one, Strike could remember.

As if it had burnt him, Strike left the photograph back on the night-stand. He knew what Aiden meant when she said she missed home far too well. Home, in the best times of the relationship, had been his -their- flat smelling of Robin's perfume, snuggles the four of them in bed, breakfast in bed, playing all day long, every bath of the kids was a bubble party, and on the weekends, Robin would cook muffins with Aiden. Home had been warm, sweet and perfect, and it had died along with their relationship.

  
  



	3. Competition

**Chapter 3:**

The next day, Strike woke-up with a headache, and saw empty glass bottles of Doom Bar piling-up on the night-stand. He coughed hard, which woke him completely up, and got up, putting on his prosthesis and going to the bathroom. As he got naked to jump into the shower, he stared at his pale reflection in the mirror and wished he didn't look so old. He was, at least, half-fit, but ever since Bruno had been born, he had barely had the time to hit the gym and he had been noticing how lately he got breathless easier. He needed to get in shape again, before his heart started hurting just from climbing two steps.

Lately all the days were boring him. It had been happening more and more frequently since the break-up, that he felt detached from life, like it happened before him and he was just watching the same boring channel time after time. He was tired of following people whose only crime had been dating someone who didn't trust them and who was jealous all the time, he was tired of helping couples break-up, he was tired of following people around London, of assholes and tossers, he was just tired. Life, Strike imagined, had gotten more overbearing since Robin wasn't with him.

Sunday promised to be long and boring, so Strike decided to get out of the flat a little and stroll around London. Unconsciously, he was taking the right tube combination to get to Wandsworth, where Nick and Ilsa lived, and once there, he suddenly saw himself in front of their door. His thick, hairy finger pressed the doorbell and after a moment he heard Ilsa shouting 'Coming!'. A few instants more and he heard her footsteps, and then the door opened and Ilsa appeared, fully dressed and with Kenwyn in his pyjamas asleep against her shoulder. She immediately smiled at him.

“Corm! What a surprise!” Ilsa wrapped her free arm around the man who had been her best friend for over forty years and kissed his bearded cheek soundly. He kissed her shoulder and closed the door behind himself as he came into the house.

“I hope I don't come in a bad moment.”

“Not at all,” she said cheerfully. “We were just having a Disney marathon. They're just finishing _Frozen_ , because Nick says the girls need to learn they don't need any man to be happy.” She added in an amused tone.

Strike snorted a laugh and followed her into the living room. Nick and the girls were sprawled on the sofa and the three looked at him at once, the girls sprinting to Strike.

“Uncle Corm!” Sophie and Eowen yelled hugging his legs. Strike took them both in his arms at once, showing an impressive upper-body strength after years of having to compensate not having half a leg.

“Hello girls, enjoying the film?” Strike asked looking at the TV. Nick had just paused the film right as _Elsa_ was creating an ice-skating area in the town near the end of the film.

Strike knew the film well; it was Aiden's favourite ever since she was a baby, and he didn't remember the amount of times he had helped her dress as _Anna_ , her favourite character. She often called Strike her own personal Sven, because he was big and hairy, gave her kisses and carried her around.

“It's the best film ever,” said the eldest girl. “Come see with us, Uncle Corm?”

Strike nodded and let himself be dragged to the sofa while Ilsa gave him the same eyes of drooling for the sweet way into which he suddenly behaved around children, that Lucy gave him when he was nice with her sons. This was because he hadn't always been good with children, and everyone found it endearing to see him around them now. Aiden had, in truth, taught him most things about how to be a good father or uncle.

As they sat to see the last ten minutes of the film, Strike's mind was transported back to July 31st, 2014, when Aiden had been born in the Royal London Hospital. Strike could still remember the stress and anxiety while Robin pushed and grunted in pain and he whispered comforting words and caressed her back, and then how he had gone to cut the cord with large scissors he was given, and he had looked up at the baby the nurse was holding and his heart had flipped. His eyes had widened looking at the dark big eyes that stared at him, framed with quite the hairy eyebrows for a newborn, a dark mane of hair on top of her head and her chubby cheeks, chubby legs, chubby arms, her fists closed and opening towards him. His whole life had changed in that moment, a sob had escaped his lips, and he had surprised himself and everyone with tears in his eyes. It had just been, by far, the most incredible and overwhelming (for all the right reasons) experience of his life. He could recall perfectly well how shocking it had been to see her, how much she resembled of them and their families, and how beautiful and perfect she was, and how his chest had felt so full at once. He had spent hours afterwards sitting on Robin's bed with his arms around his girls as she held their daughter, and his cheek against Robin's, observing their baby in awe as she gripped his finger and sucked on her mother's nipple like a pro. She had been such a big baby, but to Strike she had felt so tiny, so delicate,and he had known he would never be the man he once was. One couldn't, in his mind, possibly go through such experience and not be changed forever. That baby had taken her grumpy ogre of a father and cut so deep until she touched his heart and squeezed it, transforming him into a sobbing mess and making him feel more loved, more wanted, more needed, than any other time in his life. He had known right then that he would never be alone in his life, because she'd always be there to hold his hand and make him feel like the king of the world. And then, painfully, Strike remembered Aiden's look of broken, pain, and pure disappointment at him as they had told them Robin and he had broken up. Strike had felt Aiden thinking, as she stared at him, 'how could you let this happen?' and she had only been just two, but he knew it had been the day in which he no longer represented the assurance that her world would always be safe and happy. He had disappointed her to the point of no return, he had gone from being the family's caretaker, his arms always around one girl or the other, covering them with kisses, taking care of baby Bruno, and doing the impossible to care for everyone and keep everyone happy, to the man who had let her house shatter to pieces and had only been able to say 'sorry' as she cried and punched him.

“Oggy,” Nick called Strike. He blinked and looked at Nick. The TV was off and the girls were gone, and both Nick and Ilsa sat on the sofa, the latter holding Kenwyn as he slept, looking at him with worry. “Are you all right mate?”

Strike cleared his throat.

“Sure,” he nodded. “I was just deep in thought, zoned out, sorry...” he looked around. “Eowen and Sophie?”

“Playing upstairs, the film finished,” explained Ilsa.

“I'll bring some beer, looks like you need it,” Nick patted his shoulder knowingly and got up to the kitchen. Strike stared into a corner of the TV, his expression sullen and cross, and barely felt a can of Doom Bar sliding into his hand, but he took a long sip of it on instinct.

“Aiden feels she doesn't have a home anymore,” he said then, separating the can from his lips. “I get it. Without Robin in the flat, without our lives the way they were, it's not the same. It's not home. I feel it too. And she says she misses home, that she wants to go home, and I can't bring her home as much as I want to.”

There was a moment of silence, and Ilsa's gentle voice broke it.

“Have you told Robin?” Strike shook his head.

“She's worried enough,” he said, his eyes filled with tears. “She feels guilty enough.” He added in a murmur. “ _This_ is why I didn't want kids,” he said then, full of anger and sadness in his voice, “I _knew_ it wasn't going to work, and the ones to pay are always children. Aiden and Bruno did nothing wrong yet they have to suffer this the most like a cruel punishment just because Robin and I failed them beyond repair. We shattered their world. This is our bloody fault, all of it and we should've never, ever, gotten together.”

“Don't say those things Oggy, if you hadn't gotten together, think of all the great things that wouldn't have happened, including Bruno and Aiden,” Nick argued.

“Well it'd be better that way!” Strike sighed, taking another sip of beer and brushing a tear off his cheek angrily. “Better not be born that live full of sadness!”

Strike heard movement and a moment later he felt Ilsa sit next to him on her knees and wrap her arms around him. As he rested his face against her shoulder and cried like a baby, Ilsa kissed the top of his head and held him tightly, whispering anything comforting that came to her mind. A while later, as he calmed down, Nick suggested Strike they'd work together on a plan to get Robin back, if he still loved her.

“Too late,” Strike replied. “She has a boyfriend now.”

“A boyfriend?” Ilsa asked, surprised.

“She doesn't want anyone to know yet,” said Strike. “They've only just gone on a few dates. But she wants to organize drinks with me and him, so I can meet him and give my consent for him meeting the kids. And I don't want him to meet the kids, but I can't exactly say no, can't I?”

“You'd look like a jealous bastard,” Nick admitted.

“Exactly.”

“But Corm, you should stop screwing yourself for anyone's benefit,” Ilsa argued.

“Ilsa,” Strike looked at her full of sadness. “I've lost her. I always hoped with some time and space we could make things work again, we got our friendship back, we could get back together and be better than ever... but now it's clear it's not what she wants. She wants someone else and sooner or later I will have to give my thumbs up because otherwise I'm forcing her to keep a secret life away from the children, dating in secret as if it was a bad thing. What if she falls in love and wants to marry? She can't keep the kids away from that. Am I going to stand in the way of her happiness?”

“She is a mother now, her priority is her children,” Ilsa said. “I'm sure she'll put them first, even if it means screwing herself for other things, her children are part of her happiness. She can have sex when it's your turn with the kids.”

“Hell,” Nick, who was now holding Kenwyn, frowned at Strike. “What's this attitude of giving up? If Ilsa and I had given up just because we were happy dating other people, we wouldn't have the incredible life that we have now. So what if Robin has a boyfriend? You go and break his face, see how he's not so attractive anymore. We'll cover for you.”

“Or,” his wife rolled eyes, smirking, “you tell Robin how you feel, and if she rejects you, you don't stop until you win her back. You send her flowers, you write her love letters like you used to do, you remind her all the things that didn't suck of being together, and you show her you're both different people who don't need to make the same mistakes again. Look, Nick and I wouldn't have been as great parents at thirty as we are now, Robin and you weren't ready. You had children when you were just figuring out being together and living together, it was all too fast, too rushed, and of course it broke, but now you've mastered at least the children part, show her you're ready now for the whole package and that you want it.”

Strike left Wandsworth feeling more determined than ever to get his family back for Christmas. If it was what his children wanted and what he wanted, more than anything in the world, they would get it, they would show Robin how perfect and ideal things could be and she would have to accept they were happier together than apart. Cheerful now, he bought a bouquet of roses that was impressively expensive and smoked a fag as he strolled around Soho.

Ever since Robin was pregnant with Aiden smoking had become a rare habit that he only consented when he walked around the street, alone. He didn't smoke in the flat so Aiden and Bruno wouldn't even smell it, and smoking in all areas of the office was completely forbidden, since sometimes a client could have asthma, children were often around, and even if you smoke behind closed doors, the room smelled afterwards. Then Aiden, in a personal war against his smoking habits -even if she had only witnessed them when he smoke in a patio and she looked through the window, which was almost never- had once thrown a pack of his Benson & Hedges into the toilet. And she wouldn't come closer to him or speak to him if he came smelling of cigarettes.

So Strike finished his fag sitting on a bench at a garden, coughing a little afterwards and cursing himself for getting a cold in October, and phoned Robin while strolling down High Holborn Avenue.

“Hello,” Strike said cheerful. Feeling out of breath, he slowed his walk, guided by his enthusiasm. “What ya up to?”

“Kids are napping and my parents and I are watching TV,” Robin said. He could hear a smile in her voice. “You?”

“Just strolling around,” Strike said casually. “Hey, what if you leave the kids with your parents and you and I go for some drinks? We haven't been out just the two of us in forever.” He continued walking towards Robin's flat.

“Uh...” he could hear the doubt in her voice. “I don't think it's a good idea-,” Strike's coughing interrupted her for a moment. He slowed his rhythm even more, gasping for air. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Strike gripped the flowers tighter with his free hand. “Come on Robin, be a good sport. We've always gone for drinks together, let's go to the Tottenham or anywhere you want. Have a life together outside the kids, and your parents will get the time with their grandchildren that they wanted, right?”

“I know, but they didn't come here to babysit... Cormoran, what's wrong?”

Strike had begun coughing hard and had had to stop walking, sitting on the verge of a restaurant's bushes' pot and hunching forward gasping for air. He was trying to answer, but he couldn't stop coughing and gasping. His head and chest hurt all of the sudden, and he dropped the flowers to the floor, pressing the hand he had just freed against his chest as his vision became blurry and then, everything went dark as he collapsed to the ground.


	4. So f you

**Chapter 4:**

“Don't worry ma'am, we're the local police and my partner's calling an ambulance right now. Yes, the Royal London is closest...”

Strike's eyes opened and he gasped for air. His surroundings got less blurrier by the second and soon, he was able to distinguish a local police woman kneeling next to him with his phone pressed against her ear, and a local police man standing by his side with his own phone pressed against his ear and looking away as he directed passers-by away. The policewoman smiled at Strike when she saw he was awake and put a hand on his shoulder so he wouldn't try to move. Strike's head hurt but his forehead itched, and he could feel blood pouring from it. He must've fallen face first on the ground.

“He's awake, he seems okay,” the policewoman said into the phone. “Mr Strike, don't worry, the paramedics are coming, your partner's on the phone.”

Strike looked around desperately, and ignoring the curious passers-by, he looked for the flowers. He found them not far from where he was and, ignoring the police, rolled over to reach them and grip them hard. The policewoman was hanging up and putting his phone in her jacket pocket, and put a hand over his trying to make him drop the flowers.

“Leave that Mr Strike, they're not important...”

“They are,” Strike argued, feeling short of breath and weak. “They're... they're...” he tried to breathe while talking. “For my partner... for Robin... her birthday's tomorrow, she's... she's the mother of my... my children...” he said, gasping for air and gripping the flowers tighter. With his free hand, he frantically gripped the policewoman's jacket. “You give 'hem to her. You tell her... you tell her I... she's still special... to me... you tell her.”

“Mr Strike,” the policewoman continued gently. “You will get to buy her so many flowers when you're feeling okay again. I'm sure she knows how much you care. We always know.” She smiled warmly at him, but Strike shook his head, stubborn.

“Please,” he gasped. “Please, take care of them... give them to... to her... she doesn't love me anymore. She doesn't... and... my three-year-old... my baby girl... she wants her Mummy back home... you need to give her the flowers... so she comes back home... with us... please... for our daughter.” The policewoman took a deep breath and nodded, grabbing the flowers from him. They were a bit damaged from the fall, and some petals had fallen off, but she tried to mend it a little and fixed the paper wrapping around it.

“I promise I will give them to your Robin,” said the policewoman firmly, nodding. “But you have to promise me you'll let the doctors take care of you.”

“I'll do my part... if you do yours...” Strike said defiantly, smirking. He was pale and he knew something was very wrong, but he just wanted Robin to have the flowers. The policewoman laughed and shook her head.

“You know how to be persuasive, Mr Strike. Jeff, look after Mr Strike, I need to put these in the patrol car...”

Strike was in an out of conscience, constantly feeling breathless, until the paramedics came and put an oxygen mask on him. He kept feeling headache and chest pain, and told the paramedics so, and stayed awake in the ambulance, refusing to drift off. Eventually he was wheeled into the Royal London's Emergency Room, a large room with a few beds, and he was surrounded by doctors and nurses who pocked him, touched him here and there, removed his shirt, listened to his chest, and sent him to have chest X-Rays, scans, breathing tests, blood tests, echo-cardiograms, and others. With so much movement and then so much waiting, he inevitably fell asleep.

When he next woke up, Robin was sitting on a stool by his bed, holding his hand. She looked at him full of worry and anxiety and Strike squeezed her hands and lowered his oxygen mask with a free hand so he could make himself heard.

“Did you get the flowers?” he asked casually. Robin snorted a laugh and reached a hand to bury it in his curly hair. Her face was tense with worry and stress. Strike noticed then that his mobile phone, which the policewoman had taken, was on his bedside table.

“I did,” Robin replied. “Dad's just gone to put them in a vase at the flat. Why did you do that?” she said softly.

“I had to get you to come for a drink,” Strike joked, pausing to breathe from the mask. “I think they'll let me... have water.” She smirked and shook her head, and he smiled innocently.

“I meant why the flowers,” said Robin. “You used to buy me those roses when we were together.”

“Old habits die hard,” Strike lied. He knew his voice sounded weak and tired, but truth was, looking at Robin's blue-grey eyes, he felt full of strength. “And it's your birthday... in a few hours.”

The strawberry-blonde young woman nodded and kissed his hand. He took advantage of the position to caress her cheek, and she stroke his hand as he did so.

“Don't ever worry me like that. I thought you had a heart attack or something.”

“Come home,” Strike blurted out. Robin looked at him, surprised, and frowned confused.

“What?”

“Let's live together again... the four of us,” Strike said. “If you want to date other people, fine... but... you have to come back...”

“Stop it,” Robin said suddenly severe, standing up and stepping away from him as if he burned. He frowned at her. “Do you know how hard it was? But we agreed. We agreed, that even if it was the hardest thing we ever did, we would stay apart, so our children wouldn't be raised with unhappy parents. You don't get to do this. I'm going to look for the doctor.”

Leaving Strike baffled and saddened, she rushed away from him to find his doctor or a nurse that could explain him what had happened to him. Strike wasn't interested, he only wanted Robin back.

When the doctor came, Robin stood back as he explained to Strike he had fainted due to lack of oxygen flow coming into his brain, which had occurred due to some sort of disease in his lungs that was keeping them from functioning normally. They had detected he had pulmonary hypertension, but they didn't know why and were still studying the case to determine exactly what was happening because his symptoms fit many different illnesses and diseases. Therefore, they would perform a lung biopsy in the morning, using a bronchoscopy, so he wasn't allowed to drink or eat anything until the procedure. Strike regretted then not having had a bigger lunch.

As the doctor left, once he had made sure Strike was comfortable and settled down calmly, the environment between the two detectives became tense, and Strike felt suddenly angry at Robin. Why wasn't she trying? How could she move on from her family so fast? How could she betray them like that, finding another man? Why couldn't she help him put their family back together? Didn't she care?

“You should go home to the kids,” Strike said, putting the mask back on his face.

“Yeah,” Robin nodded. “My parents offered not to take the train, but I still should help with the dinner routine. I can come in the morning and hold your hand during the bronchoscopy or something, if you want.”

Strike snorted and shook his head.

“It's just a bronchoscopy, I don't want anyone,” Strike argued separating his mask a little. “You heard the doc, I'll be out of here tomorrow after that on bed rest and they will call when they have a diagnose. I'll call Nick to drive me home.”

“I can drive you.”

“I don't want you to drive me.”

She shook her head in disapproval and he thought he heard her say 'bugger off' between grilled teeth.

“Fine, have it your way,” Robin snapped.

“I would, if I didn't have to see my three-year-old child cry telling me she wants to go home, and knew she can't because to her home includes her mother, who would rather fuck a stranger than come live with us again,” Strike snapped as well, able to talk just fine if he held the oxygen mask close enough to breathe but far enough for his voice to be heard.

He had said it before he could control himself, and right away he wished he hadn't, because it was an information he'd rather keep away from Robin. Her eyes had immediately widened and she rushed to him, but he put his mask back in place and clenched his teeth, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What did you just say?” Robin asked, but he refused to answer and pretended he hadn't heard her. “Aiden did what? Cormoran, don't you fucking shut up now, I deserve to know.”

When Robin's insistence became too intense, so much she was starting to insult him and almost crying of anger, frustration, impotence and desperation for the lack of an explanation that, as minutes passed, wouldn't come, Strike closed his eyes and said one simple thing;

“You've got two seconds before I have a nurse escort you out.”

“Fuck you,” Robin snapped angrily, and Strike heard her furious walking outside the Emergency Room.

As Strike focused on improving his breathing, he reached for his phone and went to the gallery, staring at old photographs of his children and Robin, back when things had been perfectly fine. He missed those times, and he was so indescribably angry Robin didn't. He knew it was unfair to drop the bomb with Aiden and then refuse to explain further, but what else was there to explain? That no one liked their decision? That their child was getting depressed and angry from it? What was that going to fix? And besides... it wasn't like Robin didn't deduct all of that for his simple statement already.

He decided it was time to text Nick:

**'Nick, I'm at Royal London ER. Fainted in the street & theyre doin tests cause my lungs dont work too well. Bronchoscopy tomorrow & home on bedrest waitin 4 results. Take me home at 11ish? Please. Lucy drives like shit & Robins mad.'**

Strike usually liked to write perfectly fine, even when he was on the phone, but he was feeling so tired and so drowsy, he decided he didn't care enough this time. Nick's answer came after a few minutes.

**'WTF mate, I'm coming right now and I'll speak to your doctor myself, if they're doing this shit means it's time to stop smoking, there must be something seriously wrong with your lungs. I'll pick you up tomorrow as well. I'll be there in an hour. Fun fact, Robin JUST phoned Ilsa as well, and even I can hear her shouting.'**

He couldn't help falling asleep, lured by the machines and the white noise of the rain against the windows. As he closed his eyes and breathed into the oxygen mask he noticed that he hadn't been breathing so good for weeks. He was used to snoring and, due to years of smoking, he imagined his breathing wasn't as fluid as it once was, but the transformation had been such a slow progress that he hadn't noticed the difference until now, when he had an aid to breathe and it became obvious that he hadn't felt as great sleeping as in that moment in a long time.

“Oggy,” Nick woke him up, and when his eyes opened, Strike saw it was dark and gloomy. It must be night now. Nick looked at him anxiously. “How are you feeling mate?”

“Tired,” Strike replied hoarsely, moving his mask to talk. “Did you speak with the doc?” the gastroenterologist nodded.

“Lung disease for sure, but they can't quite clarify what disease it is, exactly. They said the right lung is in bad shape, although the other one isn't too fit either. No more smoking, it could kill you quite fast.”

“I know.”

“I'm serious mate, you could asphyxiate in your sleep.”

“Right.”

“So what happened with Robin?”

Strike told him everything, from how he had planned to surprise her nicely with flowers to their argument and how angry he was feeling and disappointed that Robin didn't feel the same need to improve the situation. Nick listened with eternal patience and, in the end, he looked very thoughtful.

“What did she tell Ilsa?”

“Was all pissed off saying you were being a stubborn brat, that you got yourself in the hospital for smoking so much and now you were blaming her for your daughter's unhappiness about your break-up and separation. Ilsa tried to make her understand you were just heartbroken and didn't mean to hurt her, but she kept on saying 'does everyone seriously think that this is easy for me?' and claiming that no one is putting themselves on her shoes and that she suffers too, but it's not her choice if she and you just... don't fit.”

Strike scoffed and shook his head. Nick sat by his bedside and, to change topics, Strike made him explain him what the bronchoscopy was about and how would it be performed. Nick proceeded them to explain him how his nose and throat would be numbed and a thin tube would be lowered down his nose and he shouldn't feel more than slight discomfort, and they'd go in, put mini tools down the tube along with a mini camera, and extract an insignificant amount of lung while they looked through the camera for any abnormality. It left Strike feeling a bit uneasy about the procedure.

  
  



	5. The best of us

**Chapter 5:**

In the early hours of the morning, the procedure went as Nick had explained and without complications, and Strike was sent home with a portable oxygen mask to wait for a definite diagnose and then be given a treatment to follow at the hospital or home, depending on what he had. He was to be watched often, even more if he was sleeping, since they weren't sure what he had, so he was only allowed to go home if someone was there to watch over him. Between Nick, Ilsa, Lucy, Robin, and the employees, who all stepped up with offers to keep a watch, he'd be anything but alone. Since he had been given quite the drugs to stay chill and relaxed, he fell asleep in the car after an hour and a half of staying in the hospital being monitored for complications that didn't arise. Nick drove him home and showing a not-too-surprising strength, carried him as he slept up to his bed. Without bothering his deep sleep, caused by drugs and disease, Robin and Ilsa changed him into his pyjamas, Nick settled the oxygen mask on him, and he was tucked in bed.

His own coughing woke Strike up several hours later, and even though he hadn't eating in twenty-four hours, he didn't feel hungry in the slightest. His eyes stared at the ceiling for one moment, taking in where he was and how he felt, and then he noticed Aiden was sleeping next to him, one of her tiny arms thrown over his chest as she snuggled in bed against him. Strike caressed her cheek softly, feeling another wave of affection towards the kid. He imagined she had been explained he was ill, and not knowing how to make him feel better, had decided to hug him until he felt better, which always worked for her. He wondered, not for the first time in his life, what had he done to get that kind of unconditional love and worship, no matter what he did.

“You're awake.”

Strike looked up and saw Robin was peeking into the room, holding a tray of food on top of their foldable bed table and looking submissive and tired. He imagined she must've been working all morning, while Aiden was in day nursery and she also looked after their son, who wasn't in nursery, and then she must've gone to pick her up, do the grocery shopping, come back, cook, feed the kids, and now feed him. He felt a wave of gratitude towards her as well. This, however, lasted very little, as he remembered she was dating some man and refusing to give him a second chance, thus making their daughter and son sad, and got resentful again.

In the meantime, Robin had walked in and Strike saw she had made him soup of letters pasta with pieces of vegetables and chicken, one Aiden loved and he kind of loved too, although he had never eaten it before living with Robin.

“I bought beer but the doctor said you shouldn't have any until they know what's wrong, in case it worsens things,” said Robin, putting the glass of water on the bedside table and sitting on the verge of the bed, unfolding the table so it would be right on top of Strike, who was already moving to sit up against the pillows, making an effort not to bother Aiden. “They said it was fine for you to eat now, since you've been coughing and that means the anaesthesia has worn off... I hope Aiden didn't bother you, I just told her last night that you were unwell and we would come today to take care of you, and she's been so worried. She brought you Mr Alfred, to feel better.”

Only then did Strike notice the tiny stuffed lion under the duvet. Strike had bought it for Aiden as her first toy ever, and she had been the most fond of it since birth. He had a good number of photographs of baby Aiden holding the lion at all times, and she had frequently cried when it wasn't around. Strike had gotten it at the British Museum in hopes of stirring in their daughter some love for wisdom and because the lion reminded him of Robin, and it had come with its own ID Card, baptizing it as Mr Alfred the Lion.

Robin shut up and waited to see if he'd take the oxygen mask off, feed himself, or she'd do it, and Strike noticed she was feeling insecure. He could see it in her non-verbal communication. She was feeling guilty about their problems these days and thought he was going to be angry.

Strike lowered the mask and took a spoonful of soup, lifting it to his mouth. It was, as always, delicious.

“Thank you,” Strike said, surprising himself having a very hoarse voice, “it's tasty.” He avoided mentioning he wasn't even hungry.

She nodded and observed as he ate, not saying a word. He frequently had to stop himself to breathe, and he took a moment to analyse himself. His chest hurt again, even if just a little, he felt shortness of breath again, he felt fatigue, could see his hands were pallid, felt slightly feverish, he was weak, his throat was scratchy from coughing, and the idea of moving for any activity was extremely unappealing. Whatever this was, it was bad enough to make him feel exhausted and breathless even at rest. This, even if he didn't want to admit it, worried him deeply.

He finished his soup and looked up at Robin with tired eyes. He was resentful, but he didn't feel like being resentful. That woman may be doing things he disliked, but she had birthed his children without a single complain.

“How was your day?” Strike asked gently. Robin looked at him surprised, but answered.

She told him about work, gave him a quick update on their cases, told him Bruno's latest tooth was fully out, told him the things Aiden said she had done in nursery today, and about how her parents in the end had caught a train later in the morning so they could get updates on Strike's condition before they left for Masham. Strike saw on the alarm clock that it was Aiden's nap time, which meant she and Bruno would be sleeping at least for another hour.

“Hey...” Robin said suddenly. “Are you feeling so bad?” Strike shrugged.

“It feels like something's squeezing my lungs and I can't get enough air.” She then looked guiltier.

“I'm sorry,” she said surprisingly. “I never meant for any of this to happen. It breaks my heart to see Aiden, who used to be the life and soul of the house, be so quiet and so... sad. She used to want to see photographs all the time, and now she doesn't. And when it's my turn to have them, she's always asking why Daddy can't come for bed time stories so someone can do the male characters' voices. It breaks my heart,” she said, with tears in her eyes and a hoarse voice with emotion. “I thought that maybe, if she got used to another man around the flat, she'd see our family can keep growing from both sides, that she'd see good things could come out of this. I never meant to fuck-up. And I'll leave him. If it's the best for Aiden and Bruno, I'll leave him.” She sniffled and Strike took pity of her.

He manoeuvred the bed table onto the floor, and pulled Robin into his arms, holding her tightly.

“Ninety percent of parenthood consists in fucking-up,” he said, kissing her forehead and then putting the mask back on. At this distance, she could hear just fine. “Don't you remember the first nappy I put on?” Robin giggled.

“Aiden woke up in a bath of her own poo. Everything stunk for weeks.”

“Exactly,” Strike smiled. “And the second I tied it so strongly her belly looked about to explode, remember?” Robin giggled, nodding. “Aiden was our trial baby. Bruno, however... he makes us look like experts. Look, I know you're in the worst possible position, with two children that want us together, with me loving you and wanting to be with you and try again, and not being able to feel the same for me... I know you feel guilty and shitty, because one word of yours, and we would all be so happy, but...” Strike interrupted himself to cough. “It's not your fault. You can't make your heart feel something it won't. Don't carry the weight of the world on your shoulders, Robin. If you like this guy... try. Perhaps it'll be worth it all. Maybe he's your Rick Fantoni. Maybe he'll give you more children and when Aiden sees she has a whole other family, she will see the positive side of things and won't feel so sad anymore. And with time, I'll move on as well. But you should never be with someone you don't truly love 'cause... I saw how that looks like, and it's not pretty for a child. I won't be Matthew 2.0 either. You deserve to be happy. You deserve it all... I've been a tosser making you feel guilty...”

Robin smiled for herself, hugging him tightly, and suddenly heard a soft snore. Looking up, she saw he had fallen asleep. Giving her a speech had finished to exhaust him, and now his eyes were closed and his chest rose as he breathed in and out. She made sure Aiden and father were both comfortable, tucked them in, and picked the bed table up with all its contents. It was time to check on the youngest Ellacott-Strike.

She was just finishing her own lunch, less than an hour later, with Bruno sitting on her lap playing with his cars when she heard Strike coughing hard in his bedroom and she lifted her head, staring at the bedroom door, that was cracked open. In a matter of a minute of intense coughing, when Robin was already accommodating Bruno on the rug to play while she attended Strike, the door opened and Aiden rushed out.

“Mummy, Mummy, Daddy's feeling bad!” she said with an anguished expression.

“Don't worry darling, it's nothing, just a bit of coughing,” Robin kissed the top of her head. “Take care of your brother of a moment while I help Daddy.”

Robin rushed into the master bedroom and found Strike red in the face from effort, hunching forwards as he tried to breathe and kept coughing. She helped him sit with his foot on the floor and rubbed his back, adjusting the oxygen mask so he'd take deep breaths and comforting him verbally as much as possible, until eventually he calmed down and fell between Robin's arms, breathing hard. She could feel he was very warm, and worried he might be having a fever. He clung onto her, and she held him until it seemed like he was settled down and comfortable, when she helped him back under the duvet and tucked him down, putting another pillow under his head so he breathed better, being more propelled-up.

“It's okay,” Robin kissed his forehead. “In a couple days, we'll know what's wrong and they'll give you some meds and you'll feel better. You'll see.” Strike nodded, exhausted, and enjoyed it when she tucked him in before she went to look after their children.

“Is Daddy okay?” Aiden asked, looking all worried from the rug, where she was playing cars with Bruno.

“Well,” Robin sat with them and ran a hand through the little girl's curls. “Truth is, your father isn't feeling too all right. He needs to rest.”

“What's wrong with him?”

“He's ill, but the doctor doesn't know if it's a cold or an infection or something else. With this weather, he might've gotten some lung disease, which means the organs used to breathe are a bit hurt and while they recover, Daddy struggles a bit with coughing, like when we get sick and sneeze all over the place. The difference is that this time the doctor needs more days to figure out which medicines we should give to Daddy, but once he knows, we'll go down to the pharmacy, buy him all he needs, and Daddy will feel like a new person in just days. You've got nothing to worry about Poppet, these things happen all the time, it's just cold and it makes people ill.”

“So he's going to be healthy again? And he'll come play with us?”

“Of course he will,” Robin smiled big for them. “In the meantime, we'll stay here and take the best care of him like we've always done, does that sound cool?”

“Yeah,” Aiden smiled. “And you won't go?”

“I'm not going anywhere,” Robin affirmed. “Now brush your teeth lady, and we'll play for a bit.”

In the afternoon, Lucy came to give her a break and Robin took the kids to the park, pushing Bruno in the swings while Aiden slid down the sledge several times. Being there, she recalled past times, when Aiden had been as old as Bruno was now, and Strike had ran around, prosthesis and all, playing with her and laughing, throwing her up in the air and pushing her in the swings while she laughed and laughed. They had been happy times. Robin tried to remember Strike's words and not feel so shitty; in the long-run, everything would be just fine.

When the night came, they had dinner with Lucy before she left back to her family, and Robin spoke on the phone with Nick for a bit, as he wanted to check on them and make sure they didn't need anything. Then, teeth were brushed, kids were put into their pyjamas, and Robin tucked Bruno in his crib and Aiden in her bed, kissing them both goodnight and reading them a bed-time story. She entered the living room and sighed, wondering where she was going to sleep. She could use the sofa, or perhaps the tiny guest room and studio, but she was afraid she wouldn't hear Strike asphyxiate if he struggled during the night, for any reason. She entered the master bedroom and found Strike trying to get out of bed.

“What are you doing?” Robin alerted, rushing to him.

“Toilet,” Strike murmured weakly. Robin nodded and after helping him get the prosthesis on, she put one of his arms around her shoulders and one of her arms around his hips, lifting him up and helping him walk to the bathroom.

“Don't worry, I'm right here,” she helped him stand in front of the toilet and wrapped her arms around him, standing behind him, to help him steady himself. Strike coughed again and fumbled with his pyjama trousers, lowering them and grabbing his penis to point. It was a bit weird to pee in front of his ex, with his bare arse against her pyjama trousers, but he was feeling so awfully he couldn't care less.

Robin helped him lift his trousers up again and get back into bed, where he was tucked again, during another coughing fit. As the coughing subsided, Strike noticed Robin was scribbling in a notepad.

“What'ya doin'?” Strike asked weakly.

“I'm writing down your symptoms. Nineteen-forty-one, coughing fit. Duration, thirty seconds. This way your doctor will be able to give you a more precise diagnose.”

Strike felt so grateful in that moment, he could've kissed her, but instead, he thanked her and she smiled at him.

“Partners have each other's backs, remember?”

“Yeah,” Strike nodded, sleepy. “Guest room?”

“I think I'll just sit on the armchair here,” said Robin. “What if, by any reason, you feel awful in the middle of the night? If I'm not here I won't wake-up.”

“You don't have to...”

“You'd do the same for me,” Robin shrugged. “Besides, you're my best friend and my children's Daddy. What wouldn't I do for you, uh, silly?”

 _Date me_ , Strike thought, but merely smiled a little.

“We bought this XL bed... so the kids could join us... and I'm only using half... you could use the other... if you want...” he offered.

She looked hesitantly at the side of the bed that, for years, had been hers. She wanted to say no, but she knew it was the best choice. She needed proper rest to help him, and besides, if she was on the bed, she'd feel it if the weight on the mattress shifted indicating Strike was moving a lot. And if he needed anything, all he would have to do is move a hand.

“All right, thanks,” she agreed, sliding under the duvet by his side. As they lied there, suddenly Strike broke the silence in the darkness.

“This doesn't look good, right?” he murmured. “Nick was right... It's serious.”

“You'll be fine the minute they give you a treatment, and that will be this week.”

Strike turned his head to look at her and sighed into his mask.

“I always knew I'd go first. Aiden's forty years younger than me, I knew I wouldn't get much time with her-,”

“Don't say that. You're not dying.”

“A man's life expectancy here... now... is 79 years... an amputee gets less than that. Add someone who smokes... add someone with a stressful life... add lung disease...” Strike gulped and Robin frowned. “I've got... twenty years more, maybe? Twenty-five?”

“Bugger-off, Cormoran. You're fine! You've always been fit, even when you lose your shape a little, you're on a healthy diet due to your leg, and you've been smoking very little for the past four years, you'll get your medication, get a bit more fit, and you'll live longer than I will.”

“I'm at a great risk of cardiovascular disease just... because of the fucking... leg...” he coughed some more.

“Right now you're at a higher risk of dying from strangulation than anything else, I'm warning you.” Strike snorted a laugh.

“Just... just promise me I have nothing to worry about. That if... if I'm not here... you'll do great with them. That... you'll be even better than... than my Mum... no strange men... no murderers... no druggies, no hipsters... They're going to need you to stay... for the both of us... I don't want them to be like Lucy and I. I don't want them to be a depressed mess... nor do something nuts like... the army... nor become everybody's mother and father... I want them to be like you. Brave. Strong. Happy... riding horses all across bloody Yorkshire.”

Robin contained a sniffle and nodded, reaching a hand to hold his under the duvet. His hand was too warm and sweaty, but she didn't mind.

“I promise,” she affirmed, nodding again. “They'll have the best of us, Cormoran. They'll be warriors and survivors like you, will your caring attitude and your humour, your skills and your perseverance... and they'll be stubborn and brave, sweet and gentle, with my brains and riding skills,” Strike chuckled, and she smiled, seeing his shadow nod in the darkness. “And then they'll be everything only they can be. Their own skills and talent, and a family to always push them forward. You've got nothing to worry about.”

Strike squeezed her hand.

“Thank you.”


	6. Sunflowers

**Chapter 6:**

As the days passed and Strike waited for his doctor to call with a diagnose and a treatment plan, he was just feeling worse and worse at impressive speed, and he had to admit it was unsettling. It disturbed them all to see him so sick, and Strike, who was used to fighting things he could see, felt irritatingly powerless not being able to know or see what he was fighting off. He was more and more breathless by the day, even when he was just lying down, and the effort of going to the bathroom was such that he tried to just hold on as much as he could before he actually had to move. Given the situation, Robin moved into his flat with the children, temporarily, and even worked most of the time from there, since even the effort of going downstairs to the office was a lot for Strike. Lucy and Greg offered to pick Aiden up from nursery so Robin wouldn't have to, and Ilsa had no problem driving the kid to nursery on her way to work in the morning, and then in the afternoons one or another would come to lend a hand here and there.

Three days after the bronchoscopy, Strike was sprawled on the sofa in the living room, watching as Robin worked, filling his coffee table with folders and papers from cases. Aiden was sitting on the rug with her crayons and a mountain of barely used paper sheets she could recycle for drawing, and Bruno was drinking a bottle lying on the sofa between some pillows and watching TV, his dark blue-grey eyes slightly closed as he felt calmer and sleepier. It was a tranquil morning really, and as Strike contemplated them, too weak to move nor do anything, he reflected that at least something this good had come out of his illness. The children, particularly Aiden, looked happier than ever, even with the worry about him, and things felt like they had been in the best times. It made him feel much better to wake up and see they were all there with him. Besides, the kids were such laid-back people they were happier not being too loud and enjoying just simply chilling home, which came in very handy for the situation.

“What's got you frowning?” asked Strike gently then, amused as he observed Robin. She looked up at him and smiled, seeing the diversion in his dark eyes.

“It's this case,” replied Robin. “This woman came to me saying there was a man at work who had some sort of mental disorder, like retarded or something. He had been given a low-profile job, as an auxiliary, because he wasn't very bright, and some workers were bullying him for being slow-minded. She said she and a few other girls have been the only ones to be nice with him, and that it was fine, that he was a sweetie, but lately he's harassing them. They've seen him around their houses, they've been getting love emails- yes, I know,” she rolled eyes and smirked at Strike's scoff. In his mentality, love could never go into emails, only handwritten letters. She still had her very own collection of those from him. “So she wanted to hire me to figure out if they should be worried, if he's dangerous or what he's doing, as much as it makes them awkward, it's just part of whatever brain issue he's got. They think there's some brain damage due to problems at birth, it's what they heard in the office.”

“So you infiltrated, didn't you? I remember...”

“Indeed,” Robin nodded. “I figured I could see for myself how he acted with me. Obviously, I can't let him follow me up to here, for the children and to hide my real identity and work, but he's managed to send me letters, to my supposed office there, love letters, and it's kind of creepy. I think he's obsessed about anyone who's nice to him.”

“What're you going to do?”

“So far, just observe,” she shrugged. “What he's doing isn't a crime and he just doesn't realize it's not a welcome attitude because he's got some brain damage, but I'm following him around just to make sure he doesn't do anything too creepy. It's just that now that you're sick, I haven't been able to follow him, so I've got Angie on it.”

Angela Brosswell was an ex SIB who had worked under Strike's orders many years and had later retired after being raped by a fellow SIB, which had caused her enormous trauma and mistrust towards institutions. The only one she trusted as a boss was Strike, so she had begged him for a job. Her curriculum was impressive, so it hadn't been a problem. Now, she was, with Andy Hutchins and Sam Barclay, part of the elite team of their agency, the three employees they trusted the most and put on the biggest cases. They were also veterans on police or investigative work, and all of them older than thirty. Aside from them, they had Aria Mowley and Toby Jones, who were beginners, and were usually in charge of the lower profile stuff. They were in training, as Robin had once been, people with no criminology background, but trustworthy, hard-working, interested, passionate, and good people. And then there was their secretary, Mandy, who kept them all with the belt buckled-up and working hard, and was a bit like everybody's grandma, making sure everyone was perfectly fine. Strike and Robin had each their own tiny office, Sam, Angie and Andy had each a desk in one same room, and Toby and Aria could work at a meetings room they had. Then there was a toilet, and the reception, so their new office was bigger than the one they had once had.

“It sounds creepy,” Strike admitted, watching her.

“Which is why I haven't put it in the hands of Aria or Toby,” Robin nodded, looking at him. He looked paler and thinner by the day, she could've sworn. “How're you doing?” Strike shrugged.

“I'm getting tired of feeling like... I've got a ton of bricks on my chest, or something,” he smiled weakly and Robin squeezed his leg. Just then, Strike's mobile rang and Robin rushed to the bedroom to grab it.

Strike heard her answer to the doctor and ask him for a moment to pass the phone to Strike, and soon Strike was pressing it against his ear and removing his oxygen mask.

“Doc,” Strike said in a weak murmur, “please tell me you know what's up.”

Strike had a short phone conversation and hung up. Robin observed expectant.

“So?” Robin asked impatiently.

“Doc said to visit him now,” Strike replied. “So he can explain what I've got... and so... he can give me... meds...”

“Is he going to give them to us straight away?” Strike nodded. “That's odd. Well, okay then, let me get my shoes on and I'll drive you. Aiden honey, I'm going to drive Daddy to the doctor to get some medicines okay? You will stay with Mandy for a bit with your brother.”

“Yay!” Aiden jumped excitedly and Strike chuckled at her.

“Come here little tornado, give Daddy a kiss,” Strike requested, and the girl jumped on the sofa and enthusiastically obliged, pressing such a kiss on his cheek that it echoed in the room.

Walking proved to be incredibly difficult because he just couldn't breathe, and Strike almost gave up and asked for a wheelchair as they entered the hospital, choosing instead to sit on a chair for just a couple minutes to get his strength back up. While Mandy made them the favour of staying with the kids, Robin was able to help Strike around the hospital and up to the doctor's consult.

“Are you his caretaker?” the doctor asked Robin as she helped Strike into the office.

“I'm his children's mother,” Robin explained, unsure. “So I guess so, yeah. I'm looking after him.”

“Then you should stay,” the doctor said. “So you can hear from me the instructions for his care.” She nodded and sat next to Strike across from the doctor.

“Am I dying doc?” Strike asked straight away. Robin shot him a surprised look, but the doctor snorted a laugh and shook his head.

“Not today, Mr Strike. What you have is complex and annoying, but won't kill you, we detected it on time.”

“So what is it?” Robin asked.

“Well first, we detected pulmonary hypertension, which is high blood pressure in the arteries of the lungs and makes the right side of the heart work harder than normal. The thing is, small arteries of the lungs, called blood vessels, have become thinner, so they can't carry as much blood and pressure builds-up. Over time, this can severely damage your heart, but so far it hasn't happened.”

“You sure?” Strike asked. “Cause I feel quite... shit...”

“I'm sure,” the doctor nodded. “I'm a cardiologist so... if it had happened, other symptoms would've shown-up. Let me auscultate you anyway.” He got up and Strike opened his shirt, too tired to move. “Yeah...” he said as he finished. “Yeah, sounds as before, not the way it would if your heart had gone mad, thankfully. The symptoms of pulmonary hypertension,” he continued sitting back down. “Include chest pain or pressure, dizziness, fainting spells, palpitations, fatigue... all of those you've experienced. No more fainting, right?” Strike shook his head. “It probably happened because you were rushing, your heart was totally overdoing it. Well, there's no cure for pulmonary hypertension, that's the bad news, but the good news is that the symptoms can be controlled, and further damage can be prevented, which is what we are going to do, using oxygen therapy at home, medicines, quitting smoking and avoiding heavy physical activities, which means no lifting children at least until you feel more recovered. We will try to slow the disease down as much as possible and deal with the symptoms the best we can, but there's a chance even with treatment, as much as we enlarge the treatment as the disease progresses, it could not be enough, eventually. Then it could be a moment to think of lung transplant.”

“Lung transplant?” Robin's eyes widened, scared.

“It'd be the last resource, if things got too bad to have a decent quality of life. I've put him on the list for transplants just in case, so if at any point things worsen so drastically it becomes a life or death situation, he can get the first available lung. This would fix everything, because what's ill is your lungs, them out, or at least one, and you're fine, but it's always the last resource. It's not just a risky, heavy major surgery, but there could be compatibility issues, rejection, life expectancy lowers, you could need further surgeries or more meds... so always the last resource.”

“We'll hope it's enough with the treatment then,” Strike said.

“Did this happen because of the smoking?” Robin asked, concerned. The doctor shook his head.

“As much as smoking didn't help, the cause is a disease called sarcoidosis, which cause is unknown. The tests, particularly the bronchoscopy, were elementary to figure this one out, but now there's absolutely no doubt. Sarcoidosis is an inflammation in a tissue, in this case, lung tissue. This means tiny clumps of abnormal tissue formed by immune cells form in your lungs. There could be no symptoms, but chest pain, coughing, shortness of breath, fatigue, fever, weight loss, headaches, weakness, fainting, abnormal heart rhythms... all of which you've had at one point or another, are symptoms. The good news is that sarcoidosis often gets better without treatment, but we will prescribe some medicines because the organs involved are as important as your lungs and heart, for a couple years. The prognosis is that up to half of all patients with this get better, without any treatment, in three years, but in your case you could develop lung damage. In any case, dying from this is profoundly uncommon. Great news is that since this is what's causing pulmonary hypertension, the moment we've got this more under control, the pulmonary hypertension should, if not completely disappear, relax a lot, even more since we're treating both things. You're going to have to be taking a lot of meds and the recuperation will be slow progress, but you'll be fine.”

“Oh, thank God,” Robin blurted out, relieved, and squeezed Strike's hand. “So no surgeries?”

“Unless the lungs or heart got very damaged, no, and it doesn't seem like it would happen with such a strong treatment as we're going to ensure. I'm going to give you some meds to take right now, I'll explain you what each is about and write down clear instructions to take them, and you can go home. By the way, quitting smoking needs to be final, okay Mr. Strike? No returning when you feel better. It could worsen your disease or make another appear. And while you're taking so many meds, I would advice against alcohol, it's dangerous. You can drink a bit, a beer a day or so, in a few weeks or months, when you're recovered enough to take less medication.”

“Whatever it takes, Doctor,” Strike nodded, thankful. “I just wanna cheer my daughter... at the Christmas school performances... she's doing some dancing dressed as a sunflower.”

“That's right,” Robin chuckled. “Prettiest sunflower out there.” The doctor smiled at them.

“Then let's make sure her Daddy's there to be the biggest fan.”

As Robin drove back home, Strike was already feeling much better, just with the medications the doctor had given him and the ones they had bought, which served as a reassurance that his problems had a treatment and he would be okay. It was then that he remembered it was Robin's actual birthday.

“Oh shit.”

“What?” Robin asked, fearing he was unwell. “Are you okay?”

“Your birthday,” Strike said. “Today, I forgot!”

“Oh, you had more important things to worry about, don't you worry,” she smiled warmly, patting his thigh as she looked towards the road. “Besides, we already celebrated. It was fun!”

“No, you know what?” Strike nodded for himself. “Tonight you're going out... with that boyfriend of yours. I'll have the kids.” Robin snorted a laugh.

“You can hardly get up from the sofa, how do you plan on taking care of a three and a one year old?” Strike frowned, thoughtful, and Robin giggled. “Forget it, Corm. It's fine, I'm happy celebrating with pizza and my family.”

“We can make it extra cheese and put candles on it,” Strike suggested, smirking. He was just so happy she was there, and so grateful. Robin grinned and nodded.

“I would love that.”

So when dinner time came, Aiden called the pizza place they loved the most and in half an hour they had two family-sized pizzas at the house, and they decorated them with candles.

“Make a wish Mummy!” Aiden reminded, as the four sat on the sofa around the pizzas. Robin grinned, looking at her family and feeling a pang of nostalgia. She had missed them like this, without fights or arguments, just them being a family. Strike looked happier than she had seen him in so long, and so did the kids, Bruno already trying to grab the candles.

“Done,” Robin blew the candles up and they applauded. Strike grinned at her, with his mouth full of pizza, and gave her a greassy kiss on the cheek.

“Can't wait how much more you achieve this year, queen,” Strike murmured, and that simple comment, along with Aiden shouting I love you with all the energy of her tiny body, was enough to make her feel all her dreams had already made true.

  
  



	7. Jordan Parker

**Chapter 7:**

A month later, Strike's improvement was remarkable. He still used an oxygen mask every night because he feared not waking-up, but he was going on short walks daily to keep himself active and do some cardio, he took his meds, he quit smoking, stopped drinking, and kept a healthy diet, and was back at work full-time and holding his children once more. He was still told to go easy, but he felt much better. It was due to this that Robin started thinking maybe it was a good moment to persuade him to go have dinner with her boyfriend so they could meet. Robin would look after the kids for one night and the men could have a men's night just the two of them.

She couldn't help feeling nervous as she met Strike after a day of surveillance in a pub to comment their cases before going back to their kids, who were at their flat, with Lucy looking after them. It was like being a young twenty-five year old woman again, going to confront her boss about something she'd done wrong.

“Uh, Cormoran,” Robin said finally, once the work and children conversation had died. “What do you think about going with Jordan, just the two of you, for dinner on Friday night? I know you can't really drink, but-,”

“Who's Jordan?” asked Strike, confused.

“Jordan Parker,” Robin said. She had spoken about him to Strike a few times. Strike frowned. “The guy I've been dating for three months?”

“Oh, right, Jordan,” Strike nodded, his expression changing into one of realization. “But Robin, we can't go for drinks, won't a dinner be boring?”

“Oh, you're both excellent conversationalists. He's a paramedic, you're a detective, you're both people with culture and adventures, there's plenty to talk about. Eat some hamburgers, jump the diet for just one night, have fun.”

“Fine,” Strike gave in without much enthusiasm. Truth is, he'd rather pretend Jordan Parker didn't exist. “Friday it is.”

“Thank you,” the kiss she pressed on his cheek almost made it all worth it.

On Friday, as Strike made sure to look bigger and stronger while getting dressed, he wondered how Jordan would be. He hadn't asked to see any photographs, Robin hadn't offered them, and Strike wondered if he was about to see another Matthew Cunliffe. Since Robin and Matthew's divorce five years before, he had married Sarah Shadlock and now they had identical triplet girls, and for what they had heard, Sarah had asked for a divorce over the summer and was seeing another man, and Matthew didn't look too happy anymore. In a similar fashion, Charlotte Ross, Strike's ex-fiancée, had a son and a daughter that were around five years-old, twins, and looked unhappier than ever, even if she faked really well for the magazines.

So Strike went off to the bar where he was meeting Jordan, feeling a painful deja-vu of the night he had met Matthew, and sat waiting for Jordan who was coming straight from work and had warned he might be a bit late. Strike didn't mind, as in the meantime he had time to mentally prepare. Ten minutes after the hour they had fixed, a man came around.

“Excuse me, are you Cormoran?”

“Yeah,” Strike looked up. He was surprised to find another version of himself. The man was tall and broad, about as much as Strike, fit, at least five years younger than Strike, with short brown hair, moustache and goatee, grey eyes and big, hairy hands. His facial hair was neatly trimmed short, and he knew how to dress. He smiled warmly at Strike.

“Great! I'm Jordan, Robin's boyfriend. She didn't exaggerate when she said you're a giant!” he commented cheerfully.

“Oh, well nice to meet you.”

“Same! I'm so very sorry I'm late, work...” Jordan sat with him. “But what am I going to tell you that you don't know, right? Robin's schedule is crazy, I imagine yours must be shit as well.”

“It is. Want a beer?”

“I'll pay this round. No alcohol right? Robin said you were sick. Tea?”

“Yeah, thank you,” Strike observed amazed as Jordan got up again, went to the bar and ordered their drinks. He came soon with their drinks and they sat.

“Have you looked at the menu yet?”

“Yeah, why don't you have a look?”

“Good idea,” Jordan grabbed the menu. When they had made their choice he went up again without complaining and came back again, sitting down. “So, Robin said you like football. Which team do you support?”

“Arsenal,” Strike looked at him almost daring him to say Arsenal was crap, to laugh.

“Really?” Jordan smiled. “My Dad does as well! If I have to go for a London one, it's always Arsenal, although I usually follow York City. I'm from York, you see?”

“Oh, Northerner like Robin. Have you been to Masham then?”

“Thousands of times, in my youth. I had a cousin who lived near St. Mary's Church, but I haven't been in years. Robin suggested we could go up next summer. I imagine you go a lot, with the children, right?”

“During the holidays mostly,” Strike nodded. “We like for the children to have a tight relationship with the family.”

“Makes sense... and where are you from? Your accent sounds uncommon.”

“I'm Cornish,” Strike replied. “Yeah, travelled a lot in my childhood, so my accent is a mix. So Jordan... you're a paramedic, right? How's that, like saving lives?”

“Like it a lot,” he nodded, smiling. “Was always my passion. Was gonna be it in York, but I got kicked-out because they had no money for so many employees, and I decided to try my luck here. It's great in here, tons of work. Fancy London to raise the kids? I mean, since both you and Robin are from the countryside.”

“It's fine,” Strike looked attentively at Jordan. He seemed nice, nothing odd. “We take them to the families a lot so... our eldest-,”

“Aiden?”

“Yeah,” Strike was surprised he remembered names. “She rides highland ponies like her mother, such expertise... she's good. My family's got her driving boats already.” Jordan laughed.

“Girl power, am I right? It's good they learn as much as possible.”

“Indeed... so you like children?”

“Very. I'm an only child so I always wanted a big family, at least a couple children. Robin wants more, in a few years, so it goes with me as well. Did you always want them?”

“Uh...” Strike tried to look thoughtful. Should he lie? If he lied, Robin would tell him the truth and he'd know, and then Robin would ask why he lied and it'd be a mess. “Not always. But when Robin got pregnant, we talked about it and... I guess we realized we were actually excited with it, you know... then she got pregnant with Bruno and we thought, great, one more! Aiden was so excited, and we figured it'd be cool.”

“Sucks that you separated then,” Jordan commented, frowning. Strike pursed his lips and shrugged.

“We didn't separate then, Jordan, and we didn't separate because Bruno was born. Our separation occurred naturally week by week and simply because sometimes being in love and having an incredible family isn't enough. I guess at some point we just... felt we could do better with someone else.”

“I'm sorry to intrude,” the younger man said apologetic. “One can't help feeling a bit weird when your partner has children with someone else.”

“Yeah, I'm sure Robin was surprised you stayed even knowing there are children involved,” Strike nodded, trying to be nice _for Robin_.

“Oh, it was shocking,” Jordan sniggered. “I'm not sure which face I must've made! But she's a fantastic woman, I couldn't say no.”

“She is,” Strike was thankful when a waiter brought them the food and he could feel less obliged to fill the silence.

“So how does it work with the kids?” Jordan asked. “Robin says there's shared custody. Does that mean that, if Robin and I moved in together some day... we'd have them a couple times a month?”

“Alternative weeks, though we're very flexible,” Strike nodded. _But I'm not letting you near the kids until they're black belts in karate_ he thought. “Don't worry, you won't be involved. Robin and I both take care of their medical appointments, school events, extracurricular activities if they had any one day, birthdays, meetings with their friends, everything. If she can't, I can and vice-versa. You'd never be put in charge of anything related to them, I can assure you.”

“Oh, I don't mind. I'm happy to help Robin as much as I can, I love children. I was thinking of taking them to the films or something every now and then.”

“Perhaps, in a few years,” Strike forced a smile. “Robin and I like to be present for everything related to them. We spend all the time together that we can, the four of us, you see? To make it easier on the kids, I'm sure you understand.”

“Of course, you're the Dad, I wouldn't want to... meddle or anything...”

“No problem. The kids and I have a very thick relationship, I'm not worried. But you see, Jordan, and let me get a bit overprotective here,” he leaned over the table. “You seem like a nice guy, but I'm a very protective lion with my pride, including Robin, as my best friend, my business partner and the mother of our children. We're a pack, we're thick as thieves, and if anything happens, as little as it is, to either of them, Troy will burn, you understand? I'm a veteran, I don't joke with serious things. As long as you make Robin happy, we're mates, but if you hurt any of them, physically or not, even if it's just a tiny, insignificant thing... I will find you. That's a threat.”

Jordan gulped, and looked seriously at him, frowning.

“Woah.”

“Yeah,” Strike shrugged, smiling. “But you have nothing to worry about if you have nothing to hide. We're detectives mate, our life is all about finding jerks. But you're not one, right? You'll be the best boyfriend Robin could dream of, and a positive influence to my children, won't you?”

“Absolutely,” Jordan affirmed firmly. “You've got nothing to worry about.”

“I'm sure. Now, let me tell you the few duties you will, if your relationship with Robin got that serious one day, have to do. Spiders, the kids hate them, you see one, you kill it, before it makes a nest. Robin hates not being warned something in the kitchen has been finished, and make sure you cook, clean, neatness is super important... what else... yeah, Aiden hates being called anything but her name, and particularly hates being called princess. Only family is allowed to use pet names with her. Bruno is a kicker, ever since he was a foetus, careful with playing ball with him and careful with brushing his curls wrong. Aiden will bit your finger off if you stand between food and her, and Bruno is about the same with potatoes, for reasons unknown. And bed time story is my thing with the kids, don't get in the middle, only Robin is allowed to substitute when I can't be phoned for it. No worries, you'll get the hang of it. And if you smoke, do any drugs, bring any of your friends near my children, or touch them when they're wearing little clothes, if you bother them or intimidate them in any single way...”

“You'll find me?”

“See? You're already getting the hang of it, Jordan.” Later as Strike walked back to his flat, he was sure he had terrorized Jordan a bit in excess, but he found himself caring a lot at first and nothing in the end. The more he was in the presence of Mr Perfect, the more he felt protective and like a powerful lion. He wasn't going to let anyone stand between him and his family, and the sooner Robin had it very clear, the better.

  
  


  
  



	8. Protective Dad

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy new year ;)

**Chapter 8:**

“Cormoran Blue Strike, what did _you_ do?”

Strike looked sleepily at his ex-girlfriend. He had just arrived into the office on Saturday morning, to catch up on some paperwork, and Robin had received him with a scowl and the hands on her hips.

“Uhm...” Strike had a deja vu of what parts of his relationship with the younger woman had been like. “I for sure didn't forget to throw the trash bags,” he teased jokingly, and Robin huffed and rolled eyes.

“Jordan called me last night saying I should make sure 'my ex' doesn't mind me dating again, because you acted like an overprotective grizzly bear and threatened him.”

“We shouldn't talk about this with the kids in the next room,” said Strike, pointing with his head to the closed office where he knew their children were playing. “Quite cowardly of him to complain though, what are you, his mother?”

“He had all the right,” she lowered her voice, looking cautiously at the inner office. “He thinks you haven't moved on and told me he's not here to break us apart, that he doesn't want to meddle if there are obviously feelings in here. Cormoran, for me, could you please be nice to Jordan? He's a good guy, you told me you thought he was nice.”

“He is nice, I was just telling him if he hurt you or the children I would hurt him twice as much, nothing big,” Strike shook his head, going to make tea.

“Fine, but please make an effort so he knows it's all good. He's a sensitive guy, he's caring and sweet, he won't hurt anyone, don't be so untrustworthy.”

“Sure, because you haven't dated anyone who you thought was caring and sweet and wound-up being a royal dick,” Strike murmured full of sarcasm. “Makes one be totally calm with your decisions when it comes to men.”

Robin gave him a cold look and Strike knew he had said too much.

“That's a low blow,” she retorted. “But hey, you're right, I chose you after all, didn't I?”

“Hey!”

But the woman had disappeared inside her office. Strike puffed and finished the tea. Once it was finished and he had two mugs ready, he came into her office.

“Hello awesome people,” he said happily, as Aiden and Bruno ran to hug his legs.

“Daddy, did you sleep well?” Aiden asked.

“Very well sweetheart, you?”

“Great!”

“Dada, pwlay!” Bruno requested.

“In a minute, poppet, let me just give this to your mother.” Strike set the mug on the desk and Robin gave him a cold look. Strike lowered his voice, leaning into her. “Look, I love my family, I care for you and I feel protective towards you, I can't help it. I see how men can be every minute at work, okay? You can't blame me for being too protective. It doesn't mean I don't want for your relationships to go smoothly.” Strike separated and grinned at the kids. “How about a story before I focus on work?” the kids' cheering said it all, and Robin had to admit, he was good with them.

Robin tried to focus back into work, but she couldn't help end-up just focusing on her family. The three were snuggled on a sofa, both kids on Strike's lap, both of his big arms around them as he invented a story, including the children's suggestions and making voices and faces that made them widen their eyes in surprise and fascination and giggle at times. It was at moments like these when Robin felt she saw her favourite Strike. She had always thought her favourite was the Detective Strike, but that had been before meeting Daddy Strike, the man who went to the ends of the world and beyond for his children. It had always fascinated her and touched her deeply. She had almost cried when she had woken-up once, when pregnant of Aiden, and seen Strike lying sideways on their bed, where she had been asleep, facing her belly and talking with it casually, lowering his voice a lot to avoid bothering her. She remembered still, so many years later, how he had been telling the belly how insecure he was because he knew nothing of fatherhood and hadn't a father himself, but he had promised he would try his best. Then, Robin had woken up months later, right after birthing Aiden, and had seen Strike sitting by his bed with a hand on each side of Aiden's hospital cot, staring at her with an expression full of awe she had never seen in him, his eyes glassy, and she remembered well hearing him tell the baby, thinking Robin was asleep, 'oh, I love you, baby' with such honesty that it had made his words alive. He had always tried his best and it was one of the many reasons why, when it came the time to meet with lawyers and agree on a custody, Robin had been firm that Strike stayed in their lives as much as possible. In her opinion, he could suck as a life companion, but he was the best damn father their children could ever ask for, and she'd be damned if she took him from them.

Like usual, the kids clapped enthusiastically and cheered when Strike's story ended, and he received many kisses before being allowed to sit to work. And Robin sat there, wondering if she'd be able to stay mad at him for much longer.

For three hours they worked each in their offices, with the children often going from one to the other, carrying toys, showing drawings, dancing around, until they went quiet and when Robin looked up, she saw Aiden had sat on a corner of her desk to draw quietly and Bruno was gone.

“Where's your brother, Denie?” asked Robin.

“With Daddy.”

Robin nodded and stood up, walking to the other office, right in front of hers. What she saw made every bit of resentment still lasting against Strike, vanish. There was a mountain of folders and papers on Strike's desk, but he sat on his chair, snoring softly, his arms around a little bundle on his lap that she knew to be their youngest child, and his cheek against the little head. Bruno's face was tucked into his chest and he had left a small drool stain on his father's shirt, and one of her tiny hands gripped a bit of curly dark chest hair that escaped between the buttons of the shirt, in the same fashion Aiden often did with him as well.

She returned to her desk and caressed Aiden's wavy hair softly.

“Sweetie, what do you think if you and I go for some muffins and get fat with your brother and Daddy?” Aiden giggled, sneaky, and nodded.

“Choco-choco muffins!”

The two girls went out to their favourite bakery and got a couple bags full of muffins and other sweets. Then, Robin prepared tea and while Aiden waited entertaining herself with her toys, she went to fetch Bruno. They were just as she had left them, but she managed to wriggle Bruno out of his Dad's firm grip murmuring 'it's just me' when Strike made to wake-up, and he immediately relaxed and let him have it, as if in some level of conscience he knew it was just Robin. Robin woke Bruno up softly as they walked to the reception where the tea and snacks were getting ready, and was wide awake the minute he smelled the food.

“Look after your brother two minutes while I fetch Daddy all right? You can start eating the muffins, but only your bag, the other's for Mummy and Daddy, ” said Robin, who had told Aiden on the way to the bakery that the men were asleep.

Robin walked around Strike's desk to wake him up, but then something called her attention. Between the tons of books and folders on Strike's desk, there was a document with spiral binder keeping together at least several dozens of pages. It was underneath other papers, but part of it wasn't, and Robin could read part of the title, that started 'Last w...' Feeling her heart flip, she cautiously pulled the document from the mountain and, checking Strike still slept, she sat on one of his chairs with the document. It said 'Last will and testament of Cormoran Blue Strike' and below a date corresponding to merely a couple days previously. Robin passed pages quickly, seeing it all looked very official and legal. Had he really gotten so scared with his illness, he'd gone this far? Her stomach knotted as she read how Strike had left her and the children practically everything he had ' _Ms Ellacott will administrate my belongings so our children get what they need, learn to share it all, and don't fight'_. He also left her full custody of their children: _I wish for Ms Ellacott to keep taking excellent care of our children as she's done so far, to have full custody of them for the both of us, and raise them in the way I know I would've approved. She's the best mother they could ask for and I know with her by their side, they'll have everything they could possibly need, with just my absence.'_ Robin had a knot in her throat just from reading those words, she could only imagine it must've been terribly hard for him to write it. Below the strict legalities, he had added comments he wished to have taken in account when the time came, and one caught Robin's attention particularly. It said: _I wish for Ms Robin Venetia Ellacott, my forever best friend, partner and companion, to be given all the easiness to take full control of our detectives agency, the belongings I've left her, and our children's custody. If Ms Ellacott fell in love again and decided it was her wish to marry or live with someone, then I want for her to know that I give her my blessing to be happy and fulfilled, and I wish her all the best and hope our children will continue to be her priority, even when I don't doubt they will be. I want for her to feel free to be with someone else and share with him the responsibilities of parenthood. I know she will do an excellent work, as she's always done. I hope she always keeps me alive in the memory of our kids, and that she keeps being the strong and wonderful woman she's always been and lives a happy life in whichever form she chooses. I support her in all her choices and send her all my love. If anyone can accomplish the hard task in her hands, it's her._

“Don't cry,” Robin looked up, startled, and noticed Strike had stopped snoring and was awake, looking softly at her. She noticed her eyes were glassy and she had a lump on her throat that she quickly gulped.

“Why didn't you tell me you had done this?”

“I didn't think it was necessary,” Strike shrugged. “I remembered how much you've always insisted that I never forgot who suffered for real if anything happened to me and... with all that's happened... I want to make sure you are all well-covered-for. Ilsa helped me do it and found me a friend and colleague of hers to make it fully legal. Does it say anything you dislike?”

“Not that I've seen,” Robin sighed, looking attentively at him. “Cormoran... do you really feel this way? What you say about approving of me living any way I decide, with someone else if I wish to, raising our children myself...”

“It took me weeks to write all of it, and I've read it more times than I can count,” Strike straightened in his seat. “Of course I mean it, Robin. I trust your judgement, even if sometimes it doesn't seem like it. If I'm so untrustworthy with Jordan, or anyone else... it has nothing to do with my trust in you or in women in general, but with my knowledge of men, not just 'cause I'm one, but because my house's been full of them all my life. In my world, men came, fucked my mother and disappeared. In my world, men decided to take Lucy and I from schools, manipulated my vulnerable mother into doing this or that with us, using drugs, partying too much, educating us at home, went around in boxers with my sister there terrified... my childhood is something I don't want for Aiden and Bruno, Robin. I want them to have the best of that; travelling, countryside, beach, friends... but that's it. No men one after the other, no living with people they dislike, mistrust and make them feel unsafe, no step-children coming out from everywhere every five seconds, no house stinking of weed, no being taken around the world and missing school and friends because some dude decided it... And I refuse to have you be treated in the way my mother was treated either, Robin. You won't be used for sex, you won't have people reaching into your pockets to take it all, you won't be treated like an object. I'm sorry if I come rough for Jordan or whomever... but I am a father. This is my duty. Before being your friend, a decent ex, a partner... before everything I am to you, I am their father, and it is my duty to make sure their life doesn't become hell if I'm not around to help it. Part of it is making sure their mother is happy.”

“Cormoran...” Robin stood up and walked to him, not knowing what to say. She took his hands and pouted a little. “You're the best father there is, you know?” Strike half smiled and shrugged.

“I just keep thinking that... if we look for boyfriends or girlfriends... then we have to do it more seriously than if we were looking for someone to take care of our whole families in an apocalypse, you know? It's more important. It's bigger. Our children and you deserve the best, I want for Jordan to be good enough and if for that I have to be scary and press too much... it's worth it in the end.”

“You're absolutely right,” Robin kissed the top of his head. “I promise I'll take matters seriously. I won't disappoint you, I said you'd have nothing to worry about.”

“As if you could ever be disappointing,” Strike snorted a laugh. “I trust you, Robin. The kids have the best they could ask for with you.”

“They also have muffins,” Robin smiled at him. “Want to get some?”

“You should've started there! You left the piranhas with them alone!?”

Robin laughed as he ran outside the office and, putting the last will where she had taken it from, she smiled, thinking that she may have made many questionable choices in life, but having Strike be Aiden and Bruno's father had been the one decision she'd never regret.

  
  



	9. Super Dad

**Chapter 9:**

Unfortunately, as Strike's birthday came closer, so did the cold season, and on the first hours of his birthday, Robin called him in the middle of the night.

“What's wrong?” Strike said straight-away, feeling wide awake all of the sudden, pressing the phone against his ear.

“Aiden threw up and-,”

“I'm on my way, need me to fetch anything from any 24h pharmacy?”

Soon Strike had hung up, put the prosthesis on, dressed at lighting speed, packed a bag with toys and medicines, and was rushing into the car, passing by a pharmacy he found open for more medicines before arriving at Robin's flat, managing to park badly in an area he wasn't sure wasn't forbidden. But he didn't care. He pushed the lift button insistently until it closed and Robin waited for him at the threshold of the flat, looking pale and sleepless herself.

“Bruno's got a slight fever and he's coughing himself awake and crying all the time, and Aiden says her throat hurts, but when I gave her the medicine she threw it up, so maybe she's sensitive to some component of it, I don't know... we've given it to her before with no problem.”

“Some colds upset the stomach too. Viruses,” Strike put a comforting arm around her shoulders. “You go to sleep a little, I'll settle them down. You must be exhausted.”

Robin nodded and practically fell on her bed, where both children also were. Strike cuddled them both into his arms, kissing their warm foreheads.

“It hurts...” Aiden complained, tears in her eyes.

“I know baby, I know. Let me give you another medicine and we'll snuggle-up, okay?”

Aiden had her medicine and snuggled into her mother's chest as they hugged one another, and Strike dealt with Bruno, who started crying again as he coughed himself awake once more, so his father had to spend some minutes whispering comforting words, hugging him and caressing his hair until he fell asleep. Then, he settled the baby next to his sister on the big bed, wrapped both kids on an extra blanket, and took off his shoes and jumper. Robin had fallen asleep, so he tucked them all in bed and lied on it next to Bruno, over the sheets, not caring it was rather chilly, and putting an arm around the other three, he fell asleep.

He woke up hours later to a crying pair of kids, Robin rubbing her eyes awake and looking at them as if they were unidentified flying objects.

“I'll take care of them,” Strike yawned, knowing she needed more sleep. Since he hadn't removed his prosthesis because he knew the night would have a lot of getting up, he took a kid in each arm and lifted them, walking to the living room downstairs in the loft, as they both cried and wailed and Strike tried to calm them verbally. “What's wrong?” he asked sitting on the sofa and hugging them in his lap.

They both started a tirade of how awful they felt for different reasons Strike could hardly make-out from their sobbing-talking (and didn't help that they had the vocabulary proper of their age, or better said, lack of it), but in the end he understood Bruno had a headache and his nose was so obstructed with snot he couldn't even breathe, and Aiden had similar problems, adding that she only wanted to 'sweep', which Strike thought probably meant 'sleep', because she wasn't very fond of sweeping anything lately, as far as he knew.

So Strike gave them both their medicines, cleaned their noses with salty water and soft tissues and sang them lullabies to sleep, until the three of them fell asleep sitting on the sofa, the little ones snuggled against his chest, which worked for their noses to be less stuck. When Strike awoke again the sun was coming through the curtains intensely and the children had buried themselves further into him to escape from it. He heard coughing and Robin appeared in the door-frame, pale, with reddened nose, wearing her pyjamas and looking exhausted.

“Maybe you should go,” she said hoarsely. “We can't risk you getting a cold, with your disease...”

“Family first, I'll be fine,” Strike answered. “Are you sick too?” Robin nodded.

“Just put the thermometer on. 39ºC.”

“Oh, you poor thing,” Strike frowned. “Go, lie down, I'll bring soup, tea and medicine in a minute.”

“You're a babe,” Robin smiled tiredly at him and went back to her bedroom

Strike scooped up both children again, and dropped them on Aiden's bed. He stopped to tuck Bruno in his crib, settle the baby monitor camera looking at him, tuck Aiden in her bed, and then went to the kitchen and started making tea and hot soup for Robin. While the soup finished cooking in the stove, he checked the kids were okay, pressing his lips against their foreheads. They still felt a bit too warm, but he was confident they'd both be just fine soon. He stood looking at the crib thoughtful as he wondered how to lower their temperatures further. When Robin was pregnant with their first-born, they had read all they could get their hands on about baby, and he had learned by heart the many benefits of skin-to-skin contact father-baby and practised such habit from their birth. Accelerates brain development of the baby, calms, soothes and reduces stress, improves quality of sleep, enhances immune system, stimulates digestion, synchronizes heart rate and breathing, promotes psychological well-being, and those were just a few. He remembered having read somewhere that it could also help to stabilize a temperature, since he didn't have a fever. In fact, their children had barely gotten sick during the time before the separation, as they had both done skin-to-skin contact for at least an hour daily each, between other measures, so it had always worked for them.

Decidedly, Strike took off his jumper and shirt, and folded them on top of the armchair that there was next to the wooden crib. The heating was on, so it wasn't cold, it was comfortable. He looked down at himself. He didn't smell of sweat, and although he was hairy and quite big, their children had always enjoyed pulling from his chest mane. Aiden said he was soft like a kitten, so he figured it was nothing bad. Strike then leaned over the crib and carefully stripped the sweaty, warm baby of his pyjama and left him in nappy, before pulling him and hugging him against his chest, cupping his hairy head with one big hand. Bruno at first protested a little without waking up, but then he found the crook of his neck and was soon passed out again.

“That's my boy,” Strike kissed the top of his head, feeling just how hot his tiny one-year-old body was against his, it was like holding the pot of soup. He walked back to the kitchen, one-handedly poured soup into a bowl, put a spoon in, served the tea, and, one thing at a time, he took it all to Robin's bed, leaving them on her night-stand. Seeing Robin was deeply asleep, curled-up in bed with her nose all red and stuffed and tissues still clung inside her half-closed hand, he decided not to bother her and used a saucer on top of the tea mug and a small plate on top of the bowl to prevent the food from getting cold too fast.

Strike was just ready to sit on the sofa and cuddle his son when the doorbell rang, and he rushed to attend it before it woke Robin up. He looked though the peep hole and was surprised to see Jordan, Robin's boyfriend. Then, Strike opened the door, hugging his son close. Jordan eyed him with wide eyes, surprised to see him there and, probably, shirtless.

“Cormoran, what are you...?”

“I should be the one asking that,” Strike said, his voice low and steady to keep his son asleep. “My children's mother lives here, she's got custody this week, I told you we're thick as thieves and often hang at each other's even when it's not our turn with them, Jordan. But you aren't supposed to be here when the kids are here, Robin and I had an agreement you weren't to meet them yet.”

“I know,” Jordan frowned. “It's Thursday, I went to the office but Mandy said you two didn't show up and aren't picking-up the phones, but she wasn't too worried because she said today's your birthday, so perhaps you two had gone somewhere with the kids, and would call later. I, however, worried something bad had happened.” Strike raised his eyebrows. He was right, it was Thursday. “Happy birthday though.”

“Oh, right,” Strike nodded. “Thanks, I'll call Mandy right now. Look, Robin and the children are sick and it seems quite contagious, so I wouldn't stand too close. I have quite the powerful medicines because of my lungs so...” he shrugged. “I'm sorry Jordan, today's not a good day to come around. She's asleep and I'm looking after my family 'cause that's my job, I've got three feverish people here, you see? Snot and vomit all over.” Jordan's frown turned into a deep scowl.

“Oh, shit, poor things... Well let me help you then, I don't care about getting sick.”

“Oh but I do. First, with my children so sick it's not the right time to explain who you are, and we can't lie because we have a strict no-lies policy, as you probably know, and secondly, if you get sick, and Robin gets better, you'll make her sick, then she'll make our kids sick again, and we'll fall into a damn void. I'm very unlikely to get sick, but you? When did you last have your flu shot?”

“Uh...”

“See? You don't even remember. I'm sorry Jordan, I do it for everybody's benefit, even your own. But I will let her know how sweet of you it has been to worry about her and come here. Ten points,” Strike winked, side smiled, and closed the door, leaving Jordan baffled. Strike would never admit he was jealous.

He phoned Mandy quickly to let her know what the situation was and to move their appointments and tell the others, and went back to Robin's bedroom. The woman was just moving to sit-up and blow her nose, surrounded by tissues.

“Hey,” Robin said hoarsely, smiling tiredly at them. She never got sick of seeing Strike being cute with their kids, and the skin-to-skin she quickly identified was one of the cutest things they did. “Is that helping?”

“I think so. Jordan was just here, I forgot to call in sick and he was worried 'cause you weren't at the office. I sent him home though, so he doesn't get sick and makes you sick when you're already better, and you make the kids sick again. We know the drill.”

“Okay, well I'll call him later to thank him personally. Although you should go too, you-,” cough, cough, “are going to get sick too, and you've got a lung disease.”

“Robin, I have all my shots in order, I take vitamins daily, I have the healthiest diet, do exercise, take medicines daily to keep my lungs fine and prevent illnesses, I'm the least inclined to get sick here,” Strike smiled. “Take your soup and your tea.”

“Thank you,” Robin hummed in delight tasting the soup and didn't bother in the slightest when Strike sat next to her propelled on the pillows to hug their son close.

“He doesn't feel so hot anymore,” Strike said, pressing his lips against his forehead. “And Denie's asleep, I think she's on the mend.”

“Of course she is, because she's got the most wonderful father,” Robin cradled the mug of tea between her hands and supported her head on his strong, wide shoulder with a sigh. Strike kissed the top of her head. “You're our life-saver.”

“Nothing you haven't done a hundred times,” he said gently.

Robin looked up at him sweetly, and pressed her lips against his shoulder. His eyes darkened staring at her, and then her mobile rang and they both got a bit startled, the moment passing. Robin reached for the mobile on her night-stand.

“Jordan, hi sweetie. Corm just told me you were just here, thank you, you're so sweet,” she said quickly into the phone. Her volume was up enough that, with Strike's musician hearing, he could listen to his part as well, and unintentionally it's what he did.

“Darling, I'm sorry, he didn't let me take care of you, I wanted to but...”

“I know, but you know it's just so you don't get sick. It's happened to us before, but if we're locked here and isolated, it won't leave my flat. When we're all good, we'll burn the flat down,” Robin joked, smiling. Jordan sniggered.

“It's great to see you're not too sick to lose your humour. How's it going?”

“Just a cold, I feel better than last night. I had to call Cormoran last night to come, because I knew this was becoming a void again, and the kids were crying and throwing up all over... he's been here ever since, and we'll probably be here for days, like usual.”

“Like usual?”

“You know how it is, with kids, they get sick every now and then. Ours not so much, thank God, but ever since we separated it happens quite frequently actually... so we're used to just moving to one another's flat until it passes. Helps everyone get better quickly.”

“Is there anything I can do?”

“No, I'm happy to know you'll stay healthy so I can give you a good smooch when I'm out of quarantine,” she said this part very low, but Strike had a very good hearing. He put a hand over their son's ear nonetheless.

“Can't wait! Hey sweetie... why was Cormoran shirtless?”

“It's called skin-to-skin contact, for the children. Helps so they recover faster, is a father-child thing we read ages ago. Always works.”

“Oh. I'm sorry, I thought...”

“I know what you thought,” Robin said, smile gone, replaced for a more tired expression and a serious tone. “Jordan, you know what happened with my ex-husband, I won't have this again...”

“I know. I won't say anything, I know you wouldn't do that.”

“You better.”

“I have to go to work, okay? But will you call me again tonight, if you can?”

“I will.”

They bid farewell affectionately and Strike pretended not to hear anything. Then Robin left her phone where it had been, resumed her position against his shoulder as the hairs on the back of his neck arose to her touch, and closed her eyes. Without seconds, her breathing and her weight indicated she had fallen asleep, soup and tea not quite finished, but content. Strike, in the meantime, experimented a pang of guilt. Was this how it was with Robin? Every man always mistrustful of her? Every man being jealous and arse?

After divorcing Matthew on September 2012 after about a month of separation, Robin had been single for about three months, and on a New Year's Eve party she and Spanner, Nick's younger brother, had kissed and gone together home that night. Strike was sure they had had sex, and the thought still twisted his stomach. Ilsa had wisely put it as her moment to be teenager and have a meaningless fling, as she had never been such a rebel, so he had tried not to flip, but then the two had begun dating. It had been low-profile, none of them meeting the other's families, and as Robin had put it years later to Strike, just something to make her busy, distract her and give her some life outside work and the traumas she was dealing with. None of them were looking for something serious, but Robin had still requested for them to be exclusive while together, just for her sake, given her history. Spanner hadn't minded. After three months dating, they had amicably decided it was time to either go one step further or break-up, and they had preferred breaking-up, knowing none of them wanted something serious nor felt the other was the one for them. Strike had managed to stay away and give her five months of singleness, figuring herself out. She had studied her butt off, worked hard, started doing yoga and dancing as extracurricular activities, and on August she and Strike had slept together on a drunken night.

Strike remembered fondly those times, despite how complicated they had been. They had been like teenagers, and it had taken them weeks after that to get their shit together and formalize their intention to date, so a relationship had begun with the end of the summer, where her divorce had begun. Their relationship had flowered like a tulip, had been secret for days at first, and had been passionate and romantic from the start, both discovering a side of themselves and of each other that they didn't know before, and drooling after one another. During the fall, around her birthday, Aiden had been conceived. They had figured-out her existence early the following year, and after deciding they'd stick together, they had moved-in into his flat, Robin leaving the flat where she was sharing with a friend of Ilsa. They had been together for just days over three years, which had added tragedy to their break-up, as it had come surprising their friends and family, days after a supposed romantic weekend escapade to celebrate their anniversary and in which it had been clear they needed to break-up and separate. His heart still broke when he remembered that day, of which he'd rather remember nothing. He had mourn his relationship like his mother dying again, or worse, but it had been coming for months.

And only just now he wondered, had it been like that with every man? Matthew had been a jealous bastard, what about Spanner? He wouldn't know. Even Strike himself had to admit he had had his moments of being a jealous dick-head. Staring as Robin as she slept, he wondered how tired she must be of them all, mistrusting the most loyal, loving woman there was. Why was his kind so terrible?

  
  



	10. Older and happier

**Chapter 10:**

The family slept until dinner time and in the meantime, Strike cuddled both children, did the laundry, cleaned around the house, managed to change the bedsheets with their occupants still asleep in the beds, put the dishwasher to work, and cooked dinner. Aiden came running to him when the smell of scrambled eggs and sausages filled the kitchen.

“Daddy, Daddy!” her curls bounced as she ran, and Strike turned and smiled at her.

“Someone's feeling better!” Strike took her up in his arms and kissed her cheek. “How're you doing, poppet?”

“I feel better,” she nodded, smiling. Her big blue-grey eyes looked at him happily and her tiny arms hugged him around his neck. “What are you doing?”

“I'm making dinner. Scrambled eggs with potatoes, sausages, tea and juice, what do you think?”

“Yummy, yummy!” he giggled, looking at her. He had been such a serious boy, but she had her mother's liveliness. “What's scawed eggs?”

“Scrambled, baby,” he corrected her. “Fried potatoes with eggs.” She hummed in approval, and nodded eagerly. “Wanna go check on Mummy? Just check, don't wake her up.” Again she nodded eagerly, and when Strike set her back on the floor, she ran like a lighting to the master bedroom.

A few minutes later, as he poured the food on plates, he heard the distinctive sound of Robin's sleepers and she appeared, holding Aiden's hand and looking much better, although undoubtedly sick. She smiled warmly smelling the food.

“See, Mummy? S-cram-bled eggs.” Robin sniggered.

“I see. And what do we say?”

“Uhm...” Aiden was thoughtful for a moment. “Oh! Thank you for cooking, Daddy.”

“Yeah, thank you Cormoran.”

“You are very welcomed. Who's going to set the table?”

“Me! Me do it!” Aiden jumped up and down. Strike handed her the cutlery and the napkins and she ran to the table.

“We should've named her Hailey like your sister wanted,” Robin joked, chuckling.

“Too late,” Strike smiled back at her and she took the rest of the things to set the table while Strike brought the plates. “Why don't you girls start without me while I check on the littlest one?”

“We'll wait,” Robin assured, helping Aiden up onto the chair.

Strike went to the nursery and walked quietly into the room, leaning over the crib. Bruno was stretched, sucking on his water baby bottle, that Strike had kept by his feet, figuring being feverish he'd frequently be thirsty, and contemplating the ceiling, and then his father, with a tired expression. His cheeks were still a bit pink with temperature, but as Strike felt for his forehead with a large hand, he thought the fever had gone down.

“You better, champ?” Strike asked. The boy nodded and stretched a hand towards him, so Strike carefully took him up in his arms, and passed him the bottle to hold while he walked them back to the dining table, where he caught Robin and Aiden chatting quietly. He loved to see them, and how Robin would often play with her curls like she did with his, while talking quietly with her lips at forehead level.

“How's my favourite boy?” Robin asked smiling at her son.

“I think he's better, he was awake.” Strike passed him to Robin, who hugged him protectively and kissed the top of his head while he closed his eyes against her chest.

They ate quietly, all tired from the long day, while Aiden was practically asleep on his mother, without appetite yet. Aiden was quietly playing with the wall calendar that Robin kept by the table, full of 'X' from the days that had passed.

“Uhm... is today twenty-three?” Aiden asked, pointing with the finger to the day that hadn't been crossed.

“Today?” Robin looked up, surprised.

“Is Daddy's birthday!” Aiden realized suddenly. “I remember you told me time ago,” Aiden ran to her father, hugging him as she climbed on him. “Happy birthday Daddy, sorry we forgot. I'll make you a drawing tom-row!”

“The best gift is that you're not so sick anymore,” Strike hugged her back, kissing the top of her head.

“Oh my! She's right, we totally forgot,” Robin's jaw dropped. “I'm so sorry Cormoran, I thought we weren't there yet! Happy birthday, God, I feel awful you spent your entire birthday-,”

“-with the people I love the most in the world?” Strike finished for her, smiling. “I wouldn't have spent it any other way. I had everything I wanted, the entire day, right here.” Robin grinned at him.

“Well I still do have a present,” Robin said wearing a sneaky smile. “Aiden, remember what I had you help me with? It's in my dresser.” Aiden nodded, and rushed out. Strike observed curiously. “Don't worry, there's also a bottle of fine whisky in the cabinet.” She added with a wink.

“There was no need,” Strike said heartfelt.

Aiden came back holding a book bigger than she was, squared, with a thick and decorated cover. With curiosity, Strike opened it and saw the first page contained a photograph of Robin holding both Aiden and Bruno, all of them full of smiles. The pages were high quality and thick, so Strike could easily turn it, and the next page just said, in shiny golden letters 'Yours' right in the middle. Strike turned the page again and this one had a handwritten letter pasted on it;

_'Dear Cormoran,_

_Happy forty-third birthday._

_It has cost me a lot to decide what you should get on your birthday. All these years, through birthdays, Christmases, and Father's Days, you've gotten mugs, watches, earphones, books, drinks, concert tickets, trips, sex, various kinds of clothing, dinners, detective-related things, musical things, etc., so I found myself thinking, what can you give to a thirty-three year-old man who's lived more than most people and received more presents that you can remember?_

_So I thought of what only I could give you, and then what our children could give you, because we had to team-up. I thought I gave you those children, which no one can replicate, and I thought, what is there bigger than that to give? I think there's nothing. We have our agency, our family, we've been blessed with an incredible life, hard-won and deserved._

_The answer came through, however, when you were in the hospital and I found myself thinking there's so much I'd want you to have, but it's not about what you should have, but about the things you do have and that not always manage to be present or do their job, or that you simply don't know or don't remember that you have. I know that a lot has changed in the past year and something, starting by us, and I figured it's so easy to list all the things we've lost, all the things that were blown away with our relationship, but that it doesn't mean there haven't been good things left behind._

_Here are some._

_For I hope when the days are the toughest, with this gift you can have hope, warmth, love, company, and all those things I can't just go and buy them to make sure you always have them, but that I'd buy for you if I could. In the meantime, I'll settle with packing them up for you in here._

_Yours,_

_Robin, Aiden and Bruno. Your family.'_

Strike looked at Robin suspiciously over the book. She was giving him an intense look that didn't say much, holding both children in her lap. Strike's attention drifted back to his present and he turned the page. Page after page, each contained one photograph of him and Robin in some moment of their life, sometimes with others, such as family or friends. Some were mere friendship and partnership, working together, having drinks together, laughing together, kissing each other, celebrating together. After at least twenty pages, Strike found another letter.

_'Here is my friendship, my care, my trust, my admiration, my loyalty, my company, my partnership, all what's good and all what's bad of me, for our lives are meant to flow one right next to the other, as we somehow belong together, and through the time that we get to be together and beyond, I will never forget you're my best friend, my greatest love, my children's father, and my forever partner. I have your back, and I won't ever leave you alone when you need me the most. It doesn't matter if we're romantically involved or not. No one will break what we have, not even ourselves, because it's impossible. You and I are in this together. It's meant to be, one way or another. So I will be there and I'll give you all of me.'_

Strike gulped a knot in his throat, and passed another twenty photographs, this time, of he and Aiden, and sometimes of he, Robin and Aiden, in chronological order. There he was sleeping next to a big belly, smiling to a newborn, his fat finger hugged by a small hand, he asleep shirtless on a hospital armchair with his arms around a little baby, Aiden laughing on his shoulders, Aiden and he dressed as Arsenal supporters and seemingly colliding fists in victory, Strike reading her a bed-time story, Halloween, Christmas... three years of memories summarized in twenty photographs and again, it ended on a note.

' _Your daughter worships you and calls you her hero, her Sven, her all and I love all of you together. I guess since you were raised without a father, it must be hard to imagine a mother can't be it all, but I promise you a mother can't be it all. When you were sick, I thought for a moment, 'what if I have to step up my game and raise them alone?' and I saw it all black. Not because I can't care for sick children, help with homework, do the laundry, cook, get them ready and going daily... but because who, if not you, would be their big soft giant? Who else would do all the voices with bed time story? Who else would make them laugh until they pee, protect them fiercely, make them feel safe and protected with just a hug? Just like no one could substitute you to me, I know no one could substitute you to them. What you have with Aiden is so precious and so special. I remember you told me, when I was pregnant, that I had to make sure you were the father she deserved and teach you all I knew, but now three years on I can promise you I never had to do anything. You saw her, and something changed and I saw it in your eyes and in hers. It was like seeing two souls that were meant to be together find each other, and it remains to be one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. You two simply belong together and you've been, from day one, the best father there could possibly be, for our Aiden. The other day I asked her, what's the best about Daddy? And she said 'he sometimes makes a mess of things, but he always tries his best and he makes me feel like I'm someone truly special'. To have a three year old tell me something like that, was shocking, surely, but she's so right, Cormoran. You make a mess of things, like that time you changed her nappy wrong and there was poo all over... but you pour your heart into everything, and she sees it. And she loves you for it. I think you will always have her love and worshipping, because she knows in her heart that her father tries his best and you make her feel special. You've earned with her something invaluable So whenever you do something wrong, think as she does; you tried your best, and at the end of the day you are still the man to make her feel truly special. Walk tall, Strike.'_

He had to do a conscious effort now, to gulp the new knot in his throat and clench his teeth. In a similar fashion, twenty photographs with Bruno came up, and at last, one last page, a simpler, shorter, note.

_'Only time will tell how much you are to Bruno, but every time he cries and he requests you and only you, I know he sees the difference just like us, and that there are spaces only you are big enough to fill. And from the moment we made him, you were always her best dude. No matter how young he is. Every time you're not around, since he was born, I've been able to tell he misses you, and all the explanation I've found is that you are his North Star._

_I think you're actually the North Star of all of us, and the glue that keep us together._

_Thank you for making us feel so loved, so cared-for, so safe, so understood, and so happy. I wouldn't get into this crazy adventure with anyone but you._

_Always.'_

Strike took a deep breath and closed the book. It was a beautiful, touching gift, he had to admit, and he could perfectly well imagine Robin and the children selecting and pasting the photographs together, and Robin wrecking her brains to figure out what message to put on each page, so he knew it had taken them so much effort. But somehow, the idea that it was Robin who had planned it for him, written those words and given it to him, was offensive. Offensive because here she was, speaking of how wonderful his union to their family was, how important and needed he was, how he kept them together, how thankful they were for him, how amazing of a partner and father he was, and how much they missed him when he wasn't around, but yet she was the sole reason he couldn't be around all the time, she was the reason he was missed, she was the reason he couldn't do as much as he wanted to do and as frequently as he wanted to do with his family. It was as if she was telling him she was so sad she hadn't been able to buy him a Christmas present while purposely choosing to have sex with some guy instead of going shopping, on his face. This was why a feeling of resentment instantly took place in his chest and he felt himself get rigid with tension. He managed a grin to his children, nevertheless.

“This is beautiful guys, thank you,” he said, opening his arms so Aiden could jump to hug him and kiss him, and hugging her in return. “You're the best, I'm going to look at this every single day.” Aiden grinned satisfied, and Bruno simply continued to sleep in his mother's arms. Robin looked at Strike with a smile.

“You truly do like it?” Robin asked excitedly. She hadn't missed the way his jaw had clenched a little in the end, but she assumed he had been trying not to get emotional.

“I love it,” Strike nodded. “I'll put it right here, so I don't forget it.” Strike stretched to leave the book on a shelf of a bookcase nearby. “Excuse me ladies, but I think I need a shower. I smell like a troll!” he chuckled at Aiden, who laughed at his exaggeration.

“You're way more handsome than a troll, Daddy.”

“Well thank you!” Strike kissed her cheek. “So sweet of you to say.”

“There are clean towels where always,” said Robin as he got up.

“Thanks.”

Strike turned the water as hot as he could withstand, removed his prosthesis, and got inside the shower supporting himself in a little bar Robin had thoughtfully put on the wall so he could shower when he was there, which at times, had been weeks. There was the time they did New Year's Eve there, and he spent three days in the house because the children cried every time he made a move to leave, and the time Robin lost her voice with a bad case of flu and he lived there for two weeks until he was sure she was okay, or the time constructions in the street had left him without electricity or water for an entire week and Robin had kindly offered him her loft to come to.

He tried his best to relax and not be so tense as he showered. He kept trying to think Robin had meant her best, that he was being stupid, but he just couldn't. He knew he was in love with Robin, and that he wanted another chance with her, but she was the one who'd rather fuck Jordan. Damn Jordan. And he was the one biting his tongue every time one of the kids cried begging for him to get back together with Robin, so he wouldn't say something along the lines of 'I would, but your mother's busy fucking some dude'.

It was extenuating to keep such a close relationship with an ex, but, even if he had never before done it, he had no choice now. For the sake for their children, their comfort, and their agency.

  
  



	11. Hard choices

**Chapter 11:**

Coming out of the shower, exhausted and frustrated, Strike dried with a towel as he sat on the toilet, and came out of the bathroom. He would sleep on the sofa, where he had left a pyjama, as he had had time to quickly pack a holdall before leaving his flat the day before, knowing from experience he wouldn't be back for days. Robin didn't have a guest room, but an inflatable mattress, which was fine, but occupied a lot of space and required for furniture to be pushed aside in the living room, for which Strike had no energy and in no way would let his sick ex-girlfriend take care of it. Very often they shared her bed, but not tonight.

He heard the house was on silence, so wrapping a towel around his waist, he walked on his prosthesis into the dark, imagining the children and Robin asleep upstairs. He'd go wish them goodnight once he was in his pyjamas and sleepers. To his surprise, however, when he went into the living room, a lamp was on and Robin was sitting on a corner of the sofa, cradling a mug of tea and staring at him.

“Jesus, Robin,” Strike breathed out the tension he had held seeing the light on. “Why aren't you in bed?” he asked, walking over to his clothes and throwing a shirt on.

“I wanted to make sure you were fine. That smile didn't quite reach your eyes.”

Strike cursed inside Robin's excellent detecting skills, trained for seven years.

“When you turn forty-three, you'll understand,” he attempted to joke with a mocking tone, reaching for his mobile, full of birthday messages and missing calls. He quickly shot a text to Lucy and Nick to let them know he was all right, but busy all day taking care of a sick family, and thanking them for thinking of him.

“Cormoran...” Robin bit her lip, looking guilty at him. “Did I do something wrong?”

Fucking another man. Refusing to come back with him. Not being in love with him anymore. Strike could think of so many things. He put the phone back on the coffee table, and flopped on the sofa, putting the trousers on without removing the towel until they were securely pulled-up beneath it.

“Why do you think that,” Strike said in a normal tone, looking at her.

“It's the sensation you give me.”

“Oh,” Strike snorted, “you mean like I gave you the sensation that I didn't want to change a nappy or have your friends come over, that kind of sensation?”

“What?” Robin frowned. “So this has become an argument about the things we used to fight about? Yes, I had those sensations and yes, our fights ended our relationship, can we move on to right now, when I've given you a birthday present and you've started behaving weird?”

“Oh I'm behaving weird now...”

“Cormoran, stop it. We're not fighting now, I'm too sick, it's your birthday, and I don't even know what we're arguing about!”

Strike puffed air, too proud to recognize this was starting to be nonsensical. They sat in silence for a few long minutes, both too stubborn to just leave it and expecting something to happen.

“How many times have you fucked him?” Strike whispered all of the sudden. He had thought the sentence, but he hadn't meant to blurt it out, and it surprised him. Robin's wide eyes stared at him.

“What?”

“How many?” Strike repeated louder. “Did you fuck him on this sofa? On your bed? At the office? Are you using condoms?”

“Cormoran!” Robin scowled. “I haven't had sex with Jordan, what the hell is wrong with you?”

“Yeah, sure...”

“Yes! God, what is it with you men putting us women in doubt all the fucking time? Have I ever lied to you, uh?”

Strike passed a hand through his wet curls, frustrated with himself, and looked away, staring at a corner of the coffee table.

“There isn't space for the two of us here, Robin. If you and he have a child, I won't get in the middle. I can't be coming here as much, not even for my children, when a whole other family lives here, I won't be your new child's Uncle Corm. No. God, even before you have a child, once he lives here with you, how am I supposed to walk around here like nothing? No... all I ask is a decent custody arrangement just like we have it, and that Bruno doesn't get confused and call him Daddy. He doesn't get to be my children's father, he doesn't get to be cool Uncle Jordan-,”

“Stop it,” Robin said more gently, putting a hand on his thigh. “Cormoran, I'm not planning for him to live with me at least in all that's left of this year, and no time soon next year. Look, you're irreplaceable, wasn't it clear in that present? No one else is their father. Jordan will just be... Jordan, Mummy's boyfriend. That's all. And you'll always be welcomed here, our custody arrangement is not going to change... I don't even want to have more children. I don't.”

“You wanted a big family,” he murmured.

“That was before we broke-up. I have Aiden and Bruno, I couldn't possibly want more... and believe me, I'll be more than careful to ensure no one else comes. I've even been thinking of... of getting surgery, if Jordan and I progress that much, because I don't want anyone else.”

He frowned, and stared at her in disbelief.

“You're going to have your tubes ligated?”

Robin shrugged, looking at her mug, both of her hands back around it.

“I don't want the headache that comes with having a child with a different man. I don't want Aiden and Bruno to feel I don't love them as much, nor for you to be in such an odd situation... nor for me. It'd be odd, Corm, very weird. I want what we have now. I want for you to always be a part of this... in this way. And I know me having another child would put everything else at risk, and I care too much. So, all the precautions I can take, I will.”

Strike nodded. They both sat there looking deflated, and only Robin's coughing interrupted the silence, after a few moments.

“If you care so much about us staying together,” said Strike then, his deep voice echoing in the room, “and if you truly meant what you wrote in that book, then I don't understand.”

“What don't you understand?”

“Why don't we get back together?” Strike asked, looking at her with his heart hammering in his chest. She looked up at him full of surprise.

“What are you talking about? We can't. Corm, we've talked about it, separating was the hardest thing we ever did, it wasn't a decision we made in three minutes, we thought so deeply about it, for so long, and we mutually agreed it was best. Getting back now, only to keep failing, would make our suffering worth nothing, and then would bring it back.”

“Robin, I'm in love with you,” Strike took her hand. “All these years, I'm in love with you. There hasn't been anyone else for me, not even just a kiss, nothing, no one. Our children wants us together, I want us together, we're meant to be...”

“And we will be! Just not romantically. We don't work that way, is proved.”

“Look, when you said yes to marrying Matthew, it was what in the moment you felt with all of your heart was right, it was what you wanted. However, a year later everything was so very different, and you weren't so sure anymore, right? A lot can happen in a year. You divorced after your wedding anniversary, for fuck's sakes. Look, we made the right decision, a year ago,” Strike insisted, holding her hand urgently. “We needed to separate and have some perspective, just like you needed to separate from Matthew and get some perspective as well. In your case, time made you see the right thing was a divorce. In my case, time made me see we need to get back together.”

“Have you forgotten how much we fought? What tells you we won't?”

“I haven't forgotten and I know we will probably fight again, but I'm not the same I was when we separated. We were inexperienced parents with too much on our shoulders and we took it out in one another. Ted had cancer then, I was a ball of stress, I got home to a crying boy of just months old, a needy daughter and a girlfriend who had her own ball of stress. Fuck, your brother had that bad fall from the horse and we thought he'd be paraplegic! It was months and months of one thing after the other, we were reasonably over our heads and the right thing to do was to separate, get a different perspective, get some air, see if we truly wanted this. Perhaps we started out too passionately and everything went too fast. You were pregnant and we were living together just months after our first kiss, then Bruno came, one thing after the other, we never slowed down, it took our breath away. We needed this break. We needed to slow down. I know all of it. And I'm sure now we're ready to slowly try again. Date, like we never did enough, just you and I. Have a life outside children, get romantic again. Before, the most romantic thing we did was change nappies together, Jesus... we could do better. We're veterans now, we're ready.”

“Cormoran, don't you understand what happened to us _is_ life? Very often we will crumble under stress, we'll want to bite our heads off, we'll be sick and tired, we'll miss each other and life outside children, we'll have everything around us crumble at once, we'll be tested to stay together or not. What happened is doomed to happen time after time because that's life.”

“I know, so we'll get better at staying together!”

“Stop it, it'd be a mistake, I have a boyfriend...”

“What do we tell Aiden when she's colouring and the messes up and gets all frustrated?”

Robin looked at him sternly at sighed.

“Stop, breathe, start over, go slower.”

“Exactly. We stopped, we breathed... we have to continue. Are you in love with Jordan, Robin? Are you?”

“You know I'm not.”

“Are you in love with me then?”

She clenched her jaw and looked aside. Strike took the mug from her, set it on the coffee table by his phone, and took her hands, kissing the spot beneath her ear that he knew so well, and her shoulder.

“Are you in love with me?” he repeated softly against her ear, seeing how her skin filled with goosebumps. He kissed her jaw. “With the man who loves you like no one else can? The man who's made you a mother?” he brought his hands around her, and pressed his lips against the top of her forehead. “The man who'd swim the Atlantic for you? Don't you want a fresh start with me, Robin? Imagine it just for a second. Snuggling again in Christmas Eve, putting the tree together, how happy Aiden and Bruno would be, how happy we would be... everything could be better than it ever was.”

“I didn't make my decision lightly, Cormoran,” Robin pushed him away and stood up. “And I stand by it. For the sake of our family.”

And she stormed back upstairs to her bedroom, leaving him baffled and alone.


	12. About hoses and genitalia

They navigated through Friday as if nothing had happened, but there was an underlying tension they both could feel. Robin was still feeling quite under the weather, but Aiden was much better, so Strike took the child to the park for a bit and brought take-out home, and at night, Strike assured Robin it was okay for her to go have dinner with Jordan, so she left, and he took care of the children. She came back early, Strike looked for any signs of something good or bad happening, but Robin's poker face had always been good, and she merely told the children she was out checking on a friend and offered to sing them a lullaby to sleep.

When Saturday morning came, however, Bruno woke them up crying so hard that even Aiden yelled for them to come quick. Strike had walked upstairs faster than a lighting, and joined Robin in the bedroom.

“He's got a lot of fever,” Robin said with an anguished expression, holding the child close and motherly peppering kisses on his warm forehead.

“But he was better last night,” Strike frowned and felt for his forehead himself. “What's wrong, Bru?”

“He's not calming down, he's just getting more worked-up...”

He carefully moved a hand to open his onesie and put his hand inside to check his belly and see if maybe it was inflated with gas, but the moment he touched it, Bruno cried harder.

“What did you do?” Robin asked.

“There's something wrong with his belly. Stay with Aiden, I'll drive him to the hospital.”

“I'm coming with you.”

“Join us there. Robin, you're only wearing a nightgown and I can just throw my coat on and I'm set, and we can't leave Aiden behind, stay, I'll be quick, and meanwhile you can calmly pack Bruno's bag, get Aiden ready, dress and come and join us.”

Robin frowned but nodded, kissed their son, and handed it to Strike.

An hour later, Strike waited patiently sitting on a corridor, drinking coffee under the morning light that came through the windows. He was wearing his pyjama and long grey coat on, a scarf messily thrown around his neck. He could only be thankful he had kept his underwear on to sleep, because he had wanted to get dressed faster in the morning to quickly go for nappies. Robin suddenly appeared looking stressed but ready for the day, and holding a confused and sleepy Aiden.

“Where is he?” Robin asked.

“They took him into the theatre,” Strike said. Robin's expression turned into one of panic, and Strike put his coffee aside on a small side table and hugged them both. “It's okay Robin, he's got appendicitis.”

“WHAT?!”

“It didn't burst. It's just a little inflamed and it bothered him, but since it didn't burst, they'll just take it out with a surgery, he'll be home in a couple days. It's not like Jack's case. Did you get Alfred?” the toy was shared between the siblings. Robin nodded against his shoulder and he felt her tremble between his arms.

“Where's Bru?” Aiden asked, squeezed between them.

“Your brother's sick, the doctor's taking a look. We'll wait here for a bit, okay? Let's go to the cafeteria and get you a juice.”

Strike took Aiden from Robin and gripped Robin's hand firmly in his own, walking them downstairs to the cafeteria. He left them sitting around a table and brought them some food and drinks, sitting between them and putting his arms around them both.

“It's all good. Just a bit longer, and we'll be with Bruno. Aiden, eat your sandwich love, it's tasty.”

“How can you be so calm?” Robin asked him.

“The doctors are great, and I know he'll be just fine. Jack recovered just fine and his appendix exploded. I've called Nick and Ilsa anyway, so they can lend us a hand with Aiden.”

“Me?” Aiden asked looking surprised and sad. “What me?”

“You're going to have to stay with Uncle Nick and Aunt Ilsa today, all right baby?” Strike asked her. “While Mummy and I keep an eye on your sick brother. You're already recovered and already yesterday didn't have a fever or anything, so you won't make them sick.”

“No, I don't wanna! I stay with you,” Aiden protested, frowning while gripping her stuffed lion Alfred between her tiny hands.

“Don't you want to play with Eowen, Kenwyn and Sophie?” Robin moved to sit next to Aiden and used a hand to rub her back soothingly. “Just for today baby, just one day.”

“Me with Mama and Dada...” Aiden's eyes filled with tears and she pouted. “Please?”

“Poppet, let's make a deal,” Strike offered, conciliatory. “You go with Uncle Nick and Aunt Ilsa today, you have lunch with them, you play with Eowin, Kenwyn and Sophie, have dinner there, and after dinner, I will pick you up and you will come back home with us, is that better? So you can sleep home?”

“It'll just be a play date, and I think Uncle Nick was planning on making pasta,” Robin added, shoving her concerns for Bruno aside to focus on their daughter's clingy nature.

Aiden's shoulders slumped and she looked down.

“Okay...”

Strike and Robin exchanged a concerned look.

“Sweetheart, what's the problem now with staying with the Herberts? You've always loved it,” inquired Robin. Aiden shrugged, and Strike took her up in his arms.

“Hey,” Strike pressed his forehead against the child's. “Tomorrow we can take my guitar and do a karaoke marathon at home, can't we?”

“Okay,” Aiden nodded, and nuzzled into Strike's neck. He hugged her, and gave Robin a nod of 'don't worry.”

“Well...” Robin finished her tea and sighed. “I'm going to call my parents and let them know...”

“We'll wait right here.”

Robin stood up and walked outside to make the calls, and Strike knew Jordan would be one of those calls. He was also worried about Bruno, but trusted it was a common surgery that they did all the time and were practically experts at. When Nick and Ilsa arrived, they sat together and did some small talk, until a nurse came to let Strike and Robin know Bruno was awake and ready for them to see them.

“We'll stay here with Denie, go,” Ilsa urged them, hugging the child with one arm.

Bruno had been put on a bed with the side bars up and surrounded by pillows to make it cosy like a crib, and he was well-tucked in and with a minimal amount of cables around. Robin cried looking at her baby, but he didn't seem to be in any discomfort, and was happy to accept their kissing and cuddling.

“You stay tonight, I'll take care of Aiden.” Strike offered.

“Okay,” Robin nodded, holding Bruno's hand and caressing his cheek, the boy having fallen asleep again.

“He's okay, Robin. The surgery was a complete success. Give it a week, and he'll be running around the house with his dinosaurs again,” Strike said confident, rubbing her back.

Bruno had an odd obsession with dinosaurs, and he had a good collection of them. He just loved them. Once, a friend of them had shown him a gecko they had, and Bruno had been obsessed, calling it 'dino, dino'.

“Bring him his triceratops tomorrow,” Robin said as they hugged later at night, before he had to leave.

“I will,” Strike nodded. “Don't go crazy in here.” He kissed his cheek and leaned to kiss Bruno's. “See you tomorrow Bru, be a good boy.”

It turned out that Aiden had a crazy good time with her godparents in the end, so she was all smiles and not the crying mess Strike had been expecting when he went to pick her up after dinner time, and he took her home to Robin's flat, of which he had a spare key. Strike decided it'd be a good idea to have a bubble bath together with all the bathtub toys, and foam all over. So he warmed up the water and tried to occupy a minimal amount of space in the tub.

“Look, Daddy, now I have a beard too!” she said, putting foam all over her face. Strike smirked and she took foam and put it on his hair. “Now you're Santa!”

“Ho, ho, ho!” he joked, making her giggle.

“Daddy, you have so much hair!” Aiden stroke his chest mane like if he was a dog.

“I do, don't I?” she nodded.

“You're soft like Ossie and Ricky,” Ossie and Ricky were the cats Nick and Ilsa had adopted as kittens five years previously. “And you're big and stwong!”

“I'm big and strong, aren't I?” Strike patted her little milky butt. “Come on little butt, let's get your hair shampooed.”

As Strike worked to wash her curly hair and put good amounts of conditioner on it, she had a complicated question to ask.

“Daddy,” she said. “What's that you and Bruno have?”

“What do we have?”

“That thing hanging between your legs. Mummy and I don't have it.”

Strike snorted a laugh, shaking his head.

“It's a thing men have, a penis. So we can pee.”

“To pee? But why not pee sitting, like me?”

“Well, I don't know, love. Men and women have some physical differences, like beard or breasts, and penis is one of them. Women don't have it, so you pee sitting down, and we have it, so we pee standing-up and moving it with our hand to aim to the toilet. Like a hose.”

“What's a hoss?”

“What we use to water the plants in Grandpa's garden. The long thing water comes from. Hose, darling.” Aiden nodded, and let him rinse her hair out.

After a good bath, Strike put the pyjamas on her, helped her brush her teeth, and tucked her in bed. He sat with his guitar, an acoustic one he had bought with his first salary ever and kept in his flat most of the time, and they had a bit of a sing along before it was time to call it a night.

“Can you stay with me?” Aiden asked, patting the bed next to her.

“Why?”

“Dark's scary.”

“Okay. I'll check for monsters first,” Strike looked under the bed and into the closet. “Okay, no monsters here. Now let's sleep.” He lied down on the bed and Aiden pretty much climbed on top of him and hugged him. He closed his eyes. “Are you afraid of the dark, Aiden?”

“Little bit. But I'm a big girl!”

“I don't doubt it,” Strike chuckled. To him, she'd always be his baby.

“You afraid?”

“Sometimes,” said Strike.

“Rilly?” she sounded surprised. “But you so brave!”

“Being brave doesn't mean you're never afraid, Poppet. It means you are afraid, but you choose to push past the fear and keep going,” said Strike, rubbing soothing circles on her back with one finger to help her fall asleep.

“Oh... and... what you afraid of?” Strike smirked. Their talkative tornado tended to speak a more sloppy English at night.

“Oh, many things. That someone in the family suffers, that work goes badly, that Mummy gets sad... I'm afraid of things going wrong. But we have to remember that more often that not, the bad things we're afraid of are worse in our imagination than in reality.”

“Daddy...”

“Yeah?” he asked patiently, trying not to fall asleep.

“Mummy's sad sometimes.”

“We're all sad sometimes, Aiden.”

“I heard her cry.” Strike opened his eyes and looked down at her shape in the dark.

“When?”

“Sometimes, at night. When she thinks we sleep.”

“Do you know why?”

“No, 'cause she sad?”

“Uh...” Strike wrapped his arms more firmly around her and closed his eyes. “I'll investigate it, love. Don't tell her you told me.”

“I won't. Daddy?”

“Yeah?”

“I love you Daddy.” Strike grinned in the dark.

“I love you too, Poppet.”

  
  


  
  



	13. Arrangements

It was a bad night for Strike. He had nightmares in which Bruno died, and woke up startled, almost throwing Aiden off the bed because she was still on top of him. The girl merely clung harder to him and Strike took a deep breath, rubbing his face with one hand and looking around in the girl's room. The sunlight was starting to creep in through the closed curtains, illuminated a small framed picture of baby Aiden with her face full of baby purée and big eyes looking to the camera, Strike, looking younger and handsome, holding her up in his arms facing the camera and Robin grinned, hugging them from his side.

His mobile buzzed on the night-stand and he stretched to attend the call, seeing it was Robin's name on the screen.

“Good morning,” Robin's tired voice came through. “Did I wake you up?”

“No, no worries. I'm just here cuddled with Aiden, she wanted me to stay last night.”

“Ah... okay. Everything all right?”

“Yeah. How's it going over there?”

“We're fine, Bruno's doing great, his doctor is so happy he's being discharged now. They gave me a list of wound care instructions and other stuff, and we've got an appointment in three days for a check-up. Could you pick us up, or should I call a taxi?”

“A taxi? So they charge you a thousand pounds?” Robin sniggered at his exaggeration. “Give me an hour, okay? I need to get dressed and coax Aiden to sleep in the car.”

“We'll wait right here. How did it go with Nick and Ilsa?”

“She had so much fun, like usual. She's just clingy.”

“Okay. See you.”

“Yeah, bye.”

Strike dropped the phone back in the night-stand and carefully wiggled free, putting on his prosthesis and getting up to visit the bathroom. Afterwards, he took Aiden, put her in the car-seat inside his BMW, wrapped a blanket over her, put his coat and shoes on and a scarf, and drove to the hospital trying not to fall asleep trying. Robin waited with Bruno in her arms, right outside the hospital, and seeing the BMW she ran into the car, set Bruno in his car-seat near Aiden, who still slept, and slid into the seat next to Strike. She gave him one look and raised eyebrows. His curls were a mess, his face was still soft with sleep, and she could see he was in pyjamas.

“Sweetie, didn't you have breakfast and get dressed?”

“You were waiting, didn't have time.”

“I wouldn't have minded to wait more.”

“No, no,” Strike frowned. “You should be showering hot and resting properly, and Bruno should be tucked in his crib. No time to waste.” Robin was pleased at his commitment, and squeezed his thigh affectionately.

“We're so far behind with work.” She commented.

“I already checked emails, sent reports, managed taxes, and sent Mandi a list of things that they need to get done for us, and agreed on meeting with Chaplan on Monday morning,” Strike informed her, driving away through busy, snowy streets. Robin looked at him impressed.

“When did you have time for all of that?” he shrugged.

“Last night while watching the telly with Aiden.”

“You're such a rock-star...” _yet you won't be with me_ thought Strike but simply smirked.

At home, they made sure Bruno was settled comfortably in his crib, took care of his wound, coaxed him to eat a bit, even if it was just drinking from his bottle, and then while Aiden played, they did some work in their laptops.

“Oh, Robin... next week on Friday you have to go over to Southend-on-Sea to interview Mrs Charice Clarkton, she's disabled and can't come over. She fears me, I think. But she loves you!”

Robin snorted a laugh.

“Will you take care of Bruno meanwhile?”

“I sure will.”

“Okay then. Where even is Southend-on-Sea?”

An hour later, after Strike had shown her in Google Maps all the ways to drive to Southend-on-Sea, in the South-East coast of England and over an hour from London by car, he went to check on their baby boy, who would be two years old in January, just in less than two months. He gently lifted his tiny shirt and checked the bandaged wound, caressed his cheek, and made sure he had a water bottle nearby, and when he went back to the living room, Aiden was snuggled on her mother's lap and Robin was playing with her hair, with both arms around her, as she listened to her antics.

“So,” Strike sat beside them, “we've kind of not given a damn about the custody arrangements, so what do you think if we stay here while Bruno's recovering, I come and go and I cede you my turn, so we don't have to be moving him around much, and then once he's all right, we go back to the usual arrangements?”

Robin pursed her lips in deep thought and nodded.

“Okay, as long as it's fine by you, you're the one loosing what could be weeks of turns.”

“It's fine,” Strike shrugged. “Bruno's the priority. Let's say until January then, give him a month to really recover?” she smiled and nodded.

“You're such a great father.”

“I try.”

“You could stay as well, if you want. I wouldn't mind, we usually spend the festivities pretty much together anyway.”

“Yes, Daddy stay!” Aiden begged enthusiastically.

“Well if my baby's asking that way, how could I say no?” Strike squeezed her cheek lovingly. “What are we going to do with the holidays, by the way? Last year we took them to St. Mawes during Christmas, this year we should go to Masham, but with Bruno...”

“Yeah, if we're not transporting him to your place, that is pretty much around the corner, we certainly aren't driving him all the way to London, we need to take care of his wound, make sure he doesn't over do it, and make sure he doesn't get another cold, which with how cold Masham is...”

“...wouldn't be an option.”

“Exactly.”

“We could invite your parents over. They can stay in my flat, if I'm staying here. Stephen and Jenny can take my guest room, and Sammy can use Aiden's bedroom. Would you let your cousin Sammy stay at your bedroom in my flat during the holidays, Aiden?”

“Yep!” Aiden nodded.

“Then we could do that, they'd be comfortable,” Robin agreed, nodding. “And perhaps Martin and Jon will join in and we can pay them an hotel room, so they're comfortable as well. Will Ted and Joan come again and stay at Lucy's, or is Lucy coming down to visit them?”

“No, she went last year with us, remember? So that means this year they'll have Christmas lunch with Greg's parents here in London, so we can see them later for Christmas dinner, be all of us together. And on New Year's, we have drinks at the Herberts as usual.”

“Sounds like a plan. I'll call them today,” said Robin. “Mum's been asking for weeks, anyway. I told her we'd go up, but now... change of plans.”

“It'll be cool, you'll see. Mrs Hampswert always gives us a whole Christmas basket!”

“With bisquits?” asked Aiden with bright eyes.

“With all the biscuits you can imagine,” Strike replied in a mysterious tone. While the pair cheered, Robin laughed and shook her head. They were just _such_ Strikes, after all. Then Aiden decided it was time to go and play, and Strike eyed Robin. “What about Jordan?”

“What about him?”

“He's your...” he looked around to make sure no kids were eavesdropping, and nodded when he heard Aiden upstairs, playing. “Boyfriend. You've barely seen him in days, with everyone with such a cold, and now the holidays are coming over. If you'd want to have an escapade with him for New Year's or something, I could make something up to excuse your absence.”

The younger woman looked at him full of surprise and astonishment, for she would've never imagined him being so attentive of her relationship with another man. It was, certainly, a new thing.

“To be honest, I'm not sure I can date him in secret much longer. Aiden's a sharp, observing person, and my mother's pretty much the same. Once everyone's here, they'll inevitably find out if I go out with him. I guess I could have lunch with him next week and explain to him what's happening and not see him while our families are right here.”

He looked down, thoughtful. He didn't want for her to be with Jordan, but he had come to understand he didn't have a choice. He had tried, with all his forces, to get her back, he had told her how much he loved her, and she had repeatedly rejected him. He had to let go, if he ever wanted to see her fulfilled in life. She wouldn't have more children, she'd stay his friend, but standing in the middle would only make her lose her forever.

“We'll tell the children the truth,” said Strike. “In two days, when Bruno's feeling a bit better... we'll tell them what's going on. And once they know, before people start coming for Christmas, we'll tell the families. That way, you can have a day-after-Christmas lunch with him, or spend New Year's with him... and I'll stay with the children, figure something out.”

Now Robin was even more surprised.

“Is that really what you want?” Strike shrugged. Better accept he had lost her, and move on.

“I love you, and I want you to be happy. And if he makes you happy, then surely.” She smiled sadly, and squeezed his hand.

“Thank you. And you know, if you ever want to be with someone else... I'll support it.” He looked sullen, and nodded just a little.

“I don't want anyone else, Robin. But thanks. I'm gonna play with Aiden.”

He left and Robin bit her lip.

“Bugger...”

A couple days later, on a cold December night, Strike ordered pizza and the four sat to devour it. Bruno was feeling better, but still snuggled with Robin, needy and clingy, and she hugged him and kissed his forehead and spoke sweetly with him as they dinned. It wasn't snowing that day, although big snowfalls were announced for the following week, and they had the heating on to make the house less cold, although snuggled on the sofa as they were, it was unlikely they'd be cold.

“Uhm, guys, Dad and I wanted to tell you something,” Robin started, once it had been a while since they had digested dinner.

“You're back together!” Aiden exclaimed excitedly. Robin and Strike exchanged a painful look.

“I'm sorry love,” Robin said. “We're not back together.” Aiden pouted and looked down. Strike kept an arm around her.

“Hey, don't be sad, Poppet. Look at us, we're still a family, we're still together all of us, this is not going to change, okay? We will always be a family, that's never going to change.”

“Okay,” Aiden nodded, and leaned on Strike's chest. He motioned for Robin to continue.

“You know Dad and I decided last year to live apart, and ever since we've taken turns so you live one week with him, the next with me... and so we're together at every important occasion, every celebration, and when we're sick. We're also together at work, and we plan holidays the four of us together. You must know that will never change, regardless of what Daddy and I do with our individual lives. We love you, nothing matters more to us than you two.”

“But if we go first,” said Aiden. “Why are you apart when we told you we want you to be together?” Robin sighed and bit her lip.

“Darling, it's not so easy,” said Strike. “I love your Mum, I will always love your Mum, and what we have together is special and is something we will never have with anyone else, but... we just can't live together. It's fine if it's some days, like now, but as a permanent thing... we're not happy being together all the time, in the way your grandparents are, or Aunt Lucy and Uncle Greg. We're better friends than anything else.”

“But nothing matters more than us...”

“I know, sweetie,” Robin smiled sadly at her. “But think about it, would it make you happy to see us unhappy all the time?” Aiden pouted, and shook her head. “Which is why we must stay apart.”

“You understand, Poppet?” Strike asked.

“I guess...”

“And you, Bru-Bru?” Robin asked their son, who nodded. “Okay so...” Strike detected her nervousness, and put an arm around her. “I've made a new friend. His name is Jordan, and he's very dear and very close to me. He's funny, kind, sweet, he's very nice to me and I'm very happy in his company, just like I'm so very happy in your company. I've told Jordan about Daddy, and about you two, and he wants to meet you.”

“Why didn't he come to your birthday party?” asked Aiden. “If he's your friend...”

“Well, I asked him not to come, because I thought it was too soon for him to meet my children. Now's been almost two months, and I think now may be a better time than it was then. I want to discuss him with you two, because I don't want to do anything with Jordan that you two don't think it's a good idea. Jordan and I, like I said, care a lot about each other, and he doesn't want to do anything that you two won't like either, because we both respect you very much and want your opinion to come first. So I want to ask you permission for him to be my friend, and for me to sometimes leave you with Daddy so I can go and be with him alone, and I want you to know that I would like for you to meet Jordan, whenever you want.”

“Mummy,” Bruno called. “Me don't unstand.”

“Me neither,” Aiden added, confused.

“Shorter explanations,” Strike murmured. “Let's try another way.” He stood up, putting Aiden aside, and grabbed the photo albums inside a drawer of a bookcase in the living room. He pulled four photographs from the album, one of each of them, and brought them to the coffee table in front of the children and Robin, then found a piece of paper, where he drew a smiley face, and set it on the coffee table as well. He sat on the floor by the coffee table, while Robin hugged both children. “First, Mummy and I met,” he put their two photographs together on the table, “and we had you two.” He put the other two photographs on top. “And then we became four. Then Mummy and I decided not to be together anymore,” he put his photograph on one corner, Robin's in other, and the children's in the middle, “but we decided you two were still in the centre of it all for us, so even though we don't live together anymore, we're still both with you as often as possible. And then Mummy met Jordan,” he put the smiley face with Robin's photo. “This doesn't change the rest, see? You're still right in the middle. We're still the centre for us, right here. And I'm still here, and Mummy's still here. The only change is that now, there could be someone else who is also here. And what Mummy is asking you is if you would like for that to happen, or would you rather have things stay like this.” And he took Jordan's representative drawing away.

The two children stared at the table for long few minutes and Robin mouthed a 'thank you to Strike'. It was remarkable for her, how sometimes, even though she had a Psychology degree, he was way better at explaining difficult things for children, even if he had always been terrible communicating with children prior to being a father. But Strike knew child trauma better than she could, and he had lived this as a child. His mother had several times sat with him and Lucy to tell them about yet another boyfriend. It was always the same 'I love you, and it'll still be us, just someone else will also come to play with us'. After a few minutes, Bruno nodded.

“I play with Jawdan?” he asked.

“Of course you can play with Jordan,” Robin grinned, kissing his head. “Both of you can. I'm sure Jordan will be more than happy to play with both of you, take you to the cinema, buy you pizza, do all kinds of cool things with you.”

“You don't mind?” Aiden asked Strike, surprising them both. Strike managed a smile.

“I would love for you to play with Jordan, baby,” Strike assured, hating himself for lying to her. “We could have meals together, the five of us. We could go to the cinema together, or to the park.”

“Okay!” Bruno approved, nodding.

“What about you, love?” Robin asked Aiden. She sighed and shrugged.

“Will he live here?”

“No,” Robin affirmed. “Unless you'd want him to live him, he wouldn't.”

“Fine,” Aiden sounded deflated, and Strike frowned. “Me tired.”

“Let's go read a bed-time story, okay?” Strike suggested. “Oh, we could do a pillow fort!”

But Aiden didn't seem too enthusiastic, and half-way through the bed time story, she fell asleep. Strike finished the story nevertheless and Bruno fell asleep in Robin's arms, so they tucked them both in their respective places, kissed them goodnight, and went to Robin's room.

“That didn't go too bad,” Strike said optimistically, standing awkwardly as Robin flopped sitting on the verge of the bed. Suddenly, Robin burst into tears. “Hey, hey...” he rushed to sit next to her and put an arm around her shoulders, as she started crying, and she moved to snuggle into his embrace.

“They will never forgive me,” Robin cried out, convulsing and trembling between his arms. “All my fecking fault! This is all... bugger, bugger!” she couldn't say more, as she was crying so hard. Strike wrapped her in his arms tightly and prayed Aiden couldn't hear them from her bedroom, which wasn't too far away.

Robin ended-up crying herself to sleep, and Strike held her for a long time. Realizing she had fallen asleep, he moved her to lie down in bed, stripped her gently of her clothes and shoes, and pulled the duvet over her, tucking her in bed and kissing her forehead. It was still warm from the crying, her cheeks still red and wet, and Strike cleaned them with her thumbs.

“Sweet dreams, Robin. Don't be so hard on yourself.”


	14. All about a girl

**Chapter 14:**

The night before Robin parted to Southend-on-Sea, she tucked their children in bed, wished them goodnight, and left to spend the night at Jordan's, once they were asleep. Strike had given her permission, and she knew they would be having sex, finally, now that Robin felt at ease with their children's somewhat of a blessing. He knew it for how gorgeous she looked before she left, for the condoms he caught sight of in her purse, for the perfume she wore. He knew she was having it for the first time in over a year, while he took care of their children, and for a moment, he felt betrayed, even if he had suggested them to have dinner that night, a late dinner, and he had offered to stay at home.

He walked upstairs and made sure Robin's bed looked like someone had slept on it that night, because even if they hated to lie to their children, they also knew there were things they shouldn't know at their young age, things that would traumatize them forever. He lied on the bed for a while, in misery, and then he went to the sofa, and fell asleep. Robin would drive from Jordan's flat in Canary Wharf in the morning, to Mrs Charice Clarkton's house in Southend-on-Sea, for work, where she would arrive early in the morning, knowing her.

They had a client, Johanna Twinkle, who thought an old, retired businessman was her biological father, she having been raised by an adoptive, loving and caring family. She had always been curious about her biological family, as happy as she was, and had once met her biological mother, before she died out of being just so old, and they had enjoyed a short but affectionate relationship during which the woman had assured their client her father was said businessman that now Strike and Robin had been hired to investigate. The problem was that the businessman was long gone as well, so they had tracked the woman who, for twenty years, had been his secretary and personal assistant, Mrs Charice Clarkton. Therefore they phoned her once, to comment the situation with her and ask if she'd be willing to be formally interviewed by them for their case, and she had seemed shy with Strike, rather fearful at his appearance, but very open with Robin, hence why she had been the one chosen to go meet the disabled Mrs Clarkton in Southend-on-Sea.

Robin phoned him early in the morning.

“We're by Basildon, just stopped to get some food in our systems, buying at a Tesco by the A13,” Robin informed him, as he prepared the children's breakfast.

“We?” Strike asked.

“Well, Jordan asked me days ago if I could drive him to her cousin's birthday party in Rochford, which is pretty much by Southend-on-Sea. So he's here with me.”

“Doesn't he have a car?”

“In maintenance since Saturday, had a breakdown,” Robin replied. “Besides, that way we can spend some time together. I'll call you around lunch, okay? Everything okay with the children, Bruno's fine?”

“Everything okay, everyone happy, listen Robin, are you staying for that birthday later?”

“No, I'll drive straight home. Jordan said his cousin offered him his guest room, so they'll party all day and he'll be back tomorrow for work, got today off.”

“Okay well, drive safe and best of luck, Ellacott.”

“Same to you, Strike,” he heard the smile in her voice. “Give my love to the kids.”

“Yeah, will do!”

Two hours later, while Strike sat with the children watching the telly, he received a phone call from Mrs Clarkton.

“Good morning Detective Strike.”

“Morning Mrs Clarkton, how can I help you?”

“I had an appointment with Detective Ellacott an hour ago, didn't I?” Strike checked his watch and frowned.

“Yeah, why, isn't she there?”

“No, she isn't. I'm worried she may have gotten my address wrong?” they checked the address, but it was right. Strike had copy-pasted it on a text to Robin days before.

“This is weird, she called me a couple hours ago and was in Basildon, almost there. Have you phoned her?”

“Yes, she's not picking-up. I supposed maybe she's driving.”

“Okay well, Mrs Clarkton, I'm so very sorry for this. You should know this is very highly uncommon of her, and I have no doubt something must have happened, so I'm going to call the police to have them look for her, and I'm coming to Southend-on-Sea and will check around myself as well, okay? I will call you the moment I know something.”

“All right, I hope it's nothing bad. Thank you, good day.”

“You too.”

With his heart hammering, Strike put the children, that had fallen asleep on him, aside on the sofa and got up to call their friend Detective Chief Inspector Eric Wardle, who worked at the Met, and also other Met friends such as DI Vanessa Ekwensi and DI Richard Anstis. They promised to search for Robin, so Strike called the office and informed his employees he wanted for them all to stop what they were doing and look for Robin. Full of worry and anxiety, he phoned thrice to Robin, and the three times he went straight for voice-mail. So he called Nick and Ilsa, informed them of the situation, and asked for permission to drop the kids off at theirs.

“Aiden, wake-up daughter,” Strike said afterwards, gently awaking the girl, who scowled at him. “Sweetie, I have to go. I'll leave you and Bruno at Nick and Ilsa's, okay?”

“Where are you going?” Strike bit his lip. They never lied to them unless it was absolutely necessary.

“I have to look for your mother. Remember she was going to work on another town today? They called me and said she isn't there, when she should be by now, and she's not picking-up her phone. I'm worried, and I'm going to go there and look for her.” Aiden's scowl deepened and she sat up, worried herself and suddenly awake.

“Isn't the police looking for her?”

“Yes, but the more people the better, right? I'm sure it's nothing, she's probably ran out of battery and got lost or something, but still I'd like to go.”

“I go with you.”

“No, sweetie. Please, I'm not arguing about this, you have to stay.”

“But why?”

“Because,” Strike thought fast. “Don't you always say you're a big girl?” she nodded fiercely. “I need my big girl to look after her little brother for me. I need my big girl to stay behind with Nick and Ilsa so I don't have to worry about her and Robin at once. I need you here. If your Mum and I aren't around, who else is going to make your brother feel safe and loved? Yeah sure we've got friends and all... but you're bigger than all of them for him. And I don't trust any of them like I trust you.”

He saw the determination in her round big eyes and she nodded.

“I stay and take care of little Bru-Bru.” she said firmly.

“I knew I could count on you!”

Strike packed their bags, scribbled instructions to care for Bruno, even though Nick was a gastroenterologist and knew perfectly well how to care for someone who had had an appendectomy, and drove to Wandsworth, where their godparents were waiting for them.

“Drive safe,” Ilsa told her best friend, hugging him before he left.

“I will. Thank you. Aiden, champ, give me a high five,” Strike demanded, and Aiden enthusiastically obeyed. “You know you're amazing, thank you so much for looking after Bru for me. You're such a great big sister.”

“I am!” Aiden nodded. “Bring Mummy home!”

“I will. Bru, you don't worry and have fun,” Strike kissed his son's cheek as he was held by Nick with a face of pure sleepiness. “I love you both, you're the greatest!”

Strike rushed back to the BMW and hit the pedal, driving as fast as he could to Basildon while still calling Robin with the hands-free. He received a call from Wardle thirty minutes into the road, informing that it was too soon to report a missing person, but that a patrol in Basildon had been sent alleging that Robin was doing a job for Wardle, and they had asked at the Tesco in the A13 and been told that the pair had been there, but hours ago. Wardle had patrols in Southend-on-Sea and Rochford looking for Robin and Jordan. He had also searched for Jordan's family, but so far had found no results and Jordan wasn't picking-up his phone either.

“You didn't find Jordan's family?!” Strike roared as he drove.

“It doesn't help that his surname is Parker, there are like two thousand in Rochford, none of them with a birthday happening any time soon,” Wardle said. “We're still looking. The guy barely uses his Facebook, and only had a small handful of friends and family in it. We've messaged the family members that appear there, essentially parents and little more, but without success, they haven't answered yet.”

“Keep trying, please, and call me when you've got something.”

“I will. Don't let panic control you, Cormoran.”

Over the five years they had known each other, Strike and then DI Wardle, now Detective Chief Inspector, had become great friends, and Strike, Wardle, Robin, and Wardle's wife April often hung-out together. Robin and April frequently had girl's nights together, and Wardle and Strike went to football games together, so Strike knew he could count on him and trust him. They help each other at work all the time, and they had each other's backs in the personal basis.

It was later, as Strike frantically drove through Southend-on-Sea looking for Robin's Land Rover, that Wardle called again.

“Cormoran, no results of the search of Robin's car, the plaque number you gave us is nowhere to be seen,” Wardle said with a deflated tone. “I've got more; Jordan Parker doesn't exist, no Jordan Parker is working as a paramedic in London, not under the descriptions you've given. We burst into his house after finding this out, and found out he isn't Jordan Parker, he's Joe Pharrell-Jones, thirty-five, from Rochester. We found his mother is dead, his father is in prison for fraud, contraband and drugs, no siblings. His mother was a paramedic for twenty years.”

“What? What?!” Strike had to stop the car before he crashed it, and pressed the phone against his ear.

“There is more, Cormoran. We found a secret safe in his closet, and it's full of photographs of Robin, this guy followed her around, has at least several hundreds of photographs. His passport his gone, all his underwear, seems like he's packed for days. No money or credit cards in the house either. His mother left him good money, so he'll be able to live nicely.”

“He was obsessed for Robin. Shit, he took her! What about his car?”

“I found papers of shopping of a car four months ago, and found a car with that description parked in his neighbourhood, far from his flat and, kid you not, without plaques.”

“He changed Robin's plaques for his own, that's why you can't find the Land Rover...”

“That's what I thought, but in the papers from the shopping of the car you can see the plaque number, so I gave it to the patrols as well, and we're waiting for results. One last thing, Cormoran.”

“Tell me.”

“There's a receipt for the shopping of a rifle three weeks ago. The rifle's not here, but he had a license.”

“Shit!”

“I'm sorry mate. I'm coming, we will find her. If it serves of any consolation, I think she's safe. The guy adores her, he doesn't want to kill her.”

Regardless of Wardle's words, he sat in deep anguish for a long time. He couldn't think. It was as if there was a cloud inside his brain, a fog numbing him. She couldn't have been kidnapped at gun-point again, right on his face. This couldn't happen again. What would he do without her? Where could he investigate? What could he do? _I'm going to break his bones_ he thought. He felt powerless. For the first time in his life, he completely depended on the police to save someone he loved.

Wardle and he met an hour later, in Southend-on-Sea, to discuss a plan of action.

“We're finding her today, Eric, she's been missing for too long already,” Strike said right away as he saw Wardle, both standing in a park.

“I know. We've found the Land Rover.”

“Have you? Where?”

“Near Rushley Island in Little Wakering, not far from here. We've got dogs looking around, I'll take you there.”

Strike drove his BMW following Wardle's car. By the River Roach, in the middle of country fields, a few cops and a bunch of police dogs were looking around bushes and trees, by the riverside, for any evidence. The Land Rover was there, the plaques removed by the police to obtain Joe's fingerprints, and the car registered. Strike was explained Robin's purse and laptop bag and Joe's suitcase were still in the car, and that they had taken fingerprints from the wheel and sent them to the lab to analyse them and see if there was any prints of someone who wasn't family. Strike thought they were losing their time with that.

“Corm!” Vanessa Ekwensi hugged him. “We're all here. We will find her.” The beautiful, black woman, looked confident. She and Robin were good friends as well, so Strike knew she wouldn't stop until Robin appeared.

  
  



	15. For her

**Chapter 15:**

Eventually it became evident that the dogs had followed the smell of Robin to Rushley Island. They weren't many, and the island was a vast expanse of countryside, so they decided the faster way to cover it was dividing. Strike and Vanessa teamed-up, and the rest went other ways. Strike was hating the fields, that were hard on his leg. It was freezing cold, the kind of cold that went through his coat and jumper and into his bones, the humidity, the wind, and they were at a mainly uninhabited island where some farming activities were conducted and that was privately owned, but police had gotten permission to register. It wasn't hard to get in really, not much security, so Strike knew Joe and Robin could've managed it.

There were hardly trees, but dozens of bushes covered each metre, and the ground was sprinkled with snow, full of herb that cracked under their shoes. Neither Vanessa or Strike spoke much, both too worried. Vanessa had a hand over her gun-holder and watched the horizon with attentive eyes. It took a while, but suddenly a small cabin appeared into view and they both stopped.

“There's nothing behind which to hide,” Vanessa pointed out, looking around. “Let's lie down.” Disliking the idea, Strike obeyed, and lied down on the cold ground. They both observed the cabin attentively. “It doesn't look like anyone is in it.”

“Which is why it's most likely that they're there.”

“Right.”

Vanessa said into her walkie-talkie their position, for the rest of the group to know, but planned so no one else would come, because there was no where to hide from the view of those inside the cabin, and they could easily get shot with Joe's riffle. Lying in the freezing cold, Strike and Vanessa planned for a way of action.

“Do you have a bulletproof jacket?” Strike asked.

“I'm wearing one, but that's about it.”

“Okay,” Strike nodded. “From here, if Joe's there, he has a privileged position to shot us to death, okay? And I don't have a bulletproof jacket, I have two baby children.”

“Right, why don't I give you the jacket?”

“As much as I'd appreciate any extra jacket right now, I must refuse. My conscience won't have your death in it. The way I see this, if we try coming from outside, he'll kill Robin before any cop reaches there. But if he catches me, then I can make him think no one's looking for him, and entertain him so you guys can assault the house.”

“Sounds like a plan, but don't you think he will kill you?”

“Maybe,” Strike recognized with a shrug.. “Give me your gun. If he tries to kill me I'll shoot him, and if he doesn't, I'll make it easy for him to kidnap me as well. Do you have a microphone to communicate with the others?”

“Uh...” Vanessa shook her head. “But the walkie-talkie should do. We hide it between your jumpers, leave it switched on, everyone will hear it. When we hear you're in there, we'll be ready to assault. I've got a second gun.” She started pulling her gun out for Strike and her walkie-talkie.

“Perfect. I don't think he'll shoot me though. Wardle didn't find a criminal record of him, murdering isn't something people just do.”

After explaining the rest of the group with the walkie-talkie what they were going to do, and getting Wardle's disapproval but permission, Strike got ready and Vanessa wished him luck and moved away to find a good place to watch the house from, looking for tall bushes. Strike stood up and took a deep breath, walking to the cabin very slowly. Only a few minutes in, someone shot from the house into the ground just before him, and he stopped abruptly, feeling a jolt of adrenaline.

“Not one step more!” he heard Jordan-Joe shout from the house, and squinting his eyes, he saw the barrel of the riffle coming through a very slightly opened window. So he was there, with Robin, and their suspicions were confirmed. Strike raised his hands.

“Excuse me!” Strike tried to appear innocent. “I know this is private land! I'm just looking for my friend, she's missing, I think she might be around here! Could I show you a picture of her?!” As Strike had imagined, there were a few seconds of silence as Joe thought he hadn't recognized his voice. Then he replied.

“Sure! Sorry! Come over!”

Strike continued walking and imagined two possible options: either he'd come in and be instantly shot to death, or he'd come in and be instantly knocked unconscious. He thought the latter was most likely, as Joe wouldn't want to kill him and have a body to hide. He knew if Strike went missing, everyone would be looking for him. Better to leave him with amnesia.

“My children won't be motherless too,” he murmured to himself, hiding his mouth in the long neck of his jumper, in case Joe was watching. Rising his voice just enough for the walkie-talkie, he continued: “Guys, I'm about to enter this cabin. Joe's in there, I've identified his voice. Break a leg.”

He continued walking towards the cabin, and then around, looking for a door. He then saw one small, wooden door open and approached it.

“Hello?” he asked again.

“Come in!” a voice shouted from inside.

“All right! Thank you!” Strike walked tentatively, and when he was at arm's length, Joe appeared into view, pointing at him with the riffle. “Oh, Jordan! What the hell?”

“Hi, Cormoran,” Jordan, who was actually Joe, smiled. “I'm afraid Robin's here. Come inside and close behind you.” Strike did so, and walked inside, as Joe pointed at him with a riffle. “How did you find this place?”

“I'm the second best detective in London,” Strike said with a shrug. “I put my team to work. It also helps that Robin's Land Rover has a geographic tracker, so I only had to go to a program in my computer and find exactly where the car was.”

Joe paled, and they both stood in a dimly-illuminated, tiny room with no furniture. Strike noticed then a lump on the floor by the corner, in the dark, and looking more attentive, he noticed it was Robin, her eyes barely opened, blood on her temple sliding down her face from a small head wound. She seemed to have her wrists tied to her back.

“Does it really have that?” Joe asked quietly.

“Sure. Didn't Robin tell you about the time a serial killer kidnapped her? Yeah, I thought it was a wise idea,” it was true they had discussed it, but had ultimately decided against it, since it was very likely was Robin kidnapped, it wouldn't be in her car. Joe, however, didn't have to know. “Raphael Chiswell, August 2012. Ironically it's our anniversary in August, funny, isn't it?” he smiled at Jordan, mockingly. “Bastard's in prison now, you should google it, see what's waiting out for you.”

Joe's expression hardened and he aimed the riffle at Strike's forehead.

“Who else knows about this cabin?”

“A Met's Detective Inspector, a Met's Detective Chief Inspector, both great friends of us, several cops, my whole team... they've got the place surrounded. I was sent to check if anyone was here, I see you are. And right now I can tell you that if I don't come back in two minutes, they will barge in. You have the option to escape, though. We're not many, they can't fully surround the cabin and the north side will be the last to be watched. Running away is a bit cowardly in my opinion, but could be your best option since, otherwise, I can't promise you'll make it out alive. What have you done to Robin?”

“Shut up, shut up! Sit there, with her, quick! You fucking liar... you will see... you will see...” as Strike rushed to Robin's side, more to check on her than because Joe said so, Joe looked for a rope more in his backpack, all while aiming the gun at Strike, and pulled out a long rope. He put the riffle on the floor and walked to Strike. “Wrists up, if you don't want me to kill you both.”

“I would, Joe,” Strike said. As he had expected, Joe's expression transformed into shock. “That's your name, isn't it? Police told me. They found about your criminal father and dead mother. Robin's got something for half-orphaned guys, I guess.”

“You fucking... Wrists up!”

“I would, Joe,” Strike repeated, unbuttoning his coat and showing his walkie-talkie, making Joe's eyes widened as he stood, petrified. “But I don't want my friends at the Met to think I'm a total looser who obeys criminals.”

Strike moved fast. He reached for the ropes Joe was holding, catching him by surprise, and only a small amount of struggle was necessary to take the ropes from him and punch him across the face with strength enough to fracture Joe's left cheek bone. Robin's eyes widened, coming more into herself due to the commotion around her, and she tried to stand up to help, but her hands were tied behind her back to a pipe in the lower part of the wall behind her, so she stumbled and fell on her knees while Strike and Joe fought. At one point, Joe ran to get the riffle he had left on the ground, and Strike only had seconds to react. He jumped forward holding one extreme of the rope in each hand, and passed the rope under Joe's chin from behind as if it was a skip rope, pulling back towards himself until Strike's back collided with another wall. Joe gasped for air, both hands moving to his neck, and Robin observed with horror. Strike, despite his anger, didn't try to make Joe's misery too long, and instead of asphyxiating him to death, he moved to block Robin's view with his body and a crack a second later indicated he had broken Joe's neck with expertise and thus killed him. Joe flopped lifeless to the floor, and Strike dropped the rope as if it was toxic.

He turned around stumbling a little, gasping for air himself, after the intense struggle, and his eyes searched for Robin's. The blood from her head had reached her chin and left some dark red drops on the neck of her blouse, and she looked to be very cold, as her long beige coat had slid down her shoulders at some point, possibly when she had attempted to wriggle herself free.

“Robin,” Strike was by her side in two seconds, at the same time the door burst open and a bunch of policemen and policewomen came inside, pointing everywhere with their guns until they saw Joe's dead body and put their guns away. “Are you all right?” Strike asked, cupping Robin's face with his hands. She seemed to be in shock and didn't answer, just stared at him with shocked eyes, pupils uneven, showing signs of a concussion.

Vanessa and Wardle were quickly by their side, cutting the ropes that held Robin and putting a thick black blanket over her shoulders.

“She's concussed,” Vanessa observed, while Strike took off his coat and put it over Robin as well.

“I'll give her a piggyback ride,” Wardle offered. “Robin, put your arms over my shoulders...”

Strike and Vanessa followed after her, while the other cops took care of the dead body and took evidence from the crime scene, and they walked into the freezing cold countryside, side-by-side.

“Should I ask why have you killed him?” Vanessa asked Strike, hands in her pockets and blowing smoke as she spoke.

“He was... going for the riffle...” Strike replied, feeling breathless. Vanessa frowned.

“You all right?”

“'M fine. Eric, we have to take her... to a hospital.”

“Southend University Hospital is not far, we'll drive her there,” Wardle replied.

They did so, driving around London Southend Airport and reaching a light-coloured building with a front wall that seemed to be covered with sheet, that to Strike resembled more a squat than a hospital, but that, according to indications, was the hospital. There, Robin's head was stitched-up as an outpatient, and she was checked over, and determined to be suffering a concussion. Strike didn't have to ask to know the hospital was from the NHS, and found it unfair that the countryside had such pathetically-looking hospitals while in London they were far too luxurious. He had seen surgeries look more real and less like they were going to fall at any point than this hospital.

“'M fine,” Robin kept saying as the nurses and doctors fussed around her.

“You're not fine... the bastard hit you with a riffle,” Strike grumbled, keeping an arm around her shoulders as she sat on a stretcher.

“Who?” Robin asked, still dizzy and disoriented but slowly coming into her senses. The minute the doctors left them alone, Strike looked sternly at Wardle.

“We're taking her to a real hospital... now.”

“Yeah, and we'll see if someone can take a look at you too. You're breathless and pale, you should be looked at,” Wardle pointed out. Strike frowned, and focused his attentions back on Robin, kissing her other temple and whispering how brave and incredible she had been, even if she had no idea what he was talking about, and she hadn't really been able to do much.

“We could go to Basildon's University Hospital,” Vanessa murmured, researching on her phone. “Seems better.”

“No, we're taking her to the Royal London... kids born there and they were treated right...”

“I thought Bruno had home birth,” Vanessa commented. Strike's frown deepened.

“Don't remind me...”

So once the doctor determined Robin was fine to go home and rest there, they got back into the police car to continue to London. The police would take care of the Land Rover, and Wardle had put a woman of trust on the mission to fetch Strike's BMW and get it to Golden Square, London, where Strike lived. In the hour long drive, Robin fell asleep on Strike's shoulder and he devoted to calling Nick and Ilsa, his sister Lucy, and Robin's parents, that although had no idea their daughter had been kidnapped, would be happy to know there was nothing to worry about anymore. As he sat in the back of the car, keeping a firm hold of Robin's left hand in his right as she slept, with her head supported on Vanessa's jacket, that was serving as a pillow on Strike's shoulder, he started to feel light-headed and became particularly aware that he hadn't stopped being breathless since the struggle with Joe, and possibly even before that. He was sweating despite how cold he was without his coat, and pale.

“Shit...” he murmured, suddenly realized. “I haven't taken my medication in... hours with... all this... not breathing right...”

“Fuck, Strike,” Wardle blurted out as he drove. “Can't we buy it in a pharmacy? I'll pass by...”

“Not without receipt,” Strike replied. “It's at the flat...”

“Is your doctor in Royal London? So we can ask them...” Vanessa suggested.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, good,” Wardle nodded. “Will you be all right for another... twenty minutes? I'll make it ten.” He added, turning the siren on and speeding up.

“Sure,” Strike closed his eyes and leaned on Robin's head, the smell of her perfume luring him to sleep.

  
  



	16. The same stone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you always for the support and your comments, which are always, even if they're only emojis or short things, very much valued and appreciated and keep my work in AO3 going.

**Chapter 16:**

It was early afternoon when Robin yawned herself awake, and feeling quite starved. The first things she noticed were white, artificial lights, hospital machines, the comfy bed on which she was lying on. She felt her feet in her socks, but shoeless, and she was light without coats on, just a blanket. She was warm and cosy, and she looked around rather confused. A pounding head made her groan and frown lightly, and then she recognized the faces that stared at her.

She was in a large hospital room where there were at least a dozen beds with blue curtains at each side, and by the feet of her bed, Ilsa, Nick, Wardle, Vanessa and Lucy formed a small group, all looking serious and surprised she was awake.

“Hey!” Robin called their attention. Her voice was hoarse from lack of use and she cleared it before speaking again. “What's going on?”

“Depends on what you last remember,” Wardle commented, as the group moved to surround her bed, and Lucy kept a soft hand on her shoulder so she wouldn't move much.

“What I last...?” Robin made an effort to really think, and her frown deepened. “I was supposed to go to work, I've got an interview in Southend-on-Sea, someone's waiting for me...”

“Not anymore. They've been let know the visit is postponed until new year,” Ilsa said carefully.

“Why?” Robin asked. “What am I doing at a hospital? I feel fine, where's Cormoran? Where are our children? You should be with them.”

“Don't worry about them, my parents came to the house to check on them, we said something had come-up,” Nick explained. “Bruno's feeling fine, ate normally at noon, his nappies are nothing extraordinary and he's playing around. And Aiden's making as many questions as always, but we told her before dinner time you'd be with her, so she's playing around like nothing happened. We explained her that you got lost with the car, but you've been found and are on your way home, just that you fell and hurt your head so you're being checked over by a doctor to make sure it's all fine.”

“Did I?” Robin asked, confused.

“We call it a merciful lie,” Ilsa half-smiled. “The truth's too rough for a child.”

“So what happened?” Robin asked. “Why don't I remember?”

“You were hit on your head quite hard, so you've got a bit of memory loss,” Vanessa explained. “We're at the Royal London now and they took a handful of tests and determined you're fine to go, as long as someone's watching over, and your parents are on their way from Masham, so someone will be watching over, and we're staying meanwhile. But you got a cut over your forehead that needed stitching, and then you looked so tired the doctor said you could stay and take a nap and leave afterwards, so now we can take you home to your daughter.”

“This makes no sense. Who hit me? Why?”

“We should just tell her everything at once, she's a detective, she won't stop making bloody questions until New Year's Eve,” Lucy pointed-out. “If her daughter serves as a reference.”

“And where's Corm?” Robin added, on a second thought, as she realised no one had asked that yet.

“Okay, look, honey,” Vanessa said. “Corm will be okay, he's just feeling a bit breathless again but his doctor is with him, so no problem. Now, this is what happened.”

“Okay...”

“You were supposed to go to Southend-on-Sea with this guy that Corm told us it turns out to be your boyfriend, thanks for letting us know.”

“Oh, shut-up, I had to tell my children first, you would've known before Christmas. But that's right! Jordan was coming with me, to his cousins' birthday party near Southend-on-Sea!” Robin suddenly remembered. “Where is he...?”

“He's uh...” Wardle shrugged. “He's safe. Answering some questions to the police.” Vanessa gave him a weird look, but Robin didn't ask more.

“Let's tell her the full story,” Vanessa said, continuing. “So you and your boyfriend got in the car, and when you were near Southend-on-Sea, you called Corm to let him know it was all good and you'd be at the meeting on time. Next, hours later, he gets a call by the person you were supposed to meet, saying you're not there, which was very odd, because you weren't even an hour away when you called Corm, so he obviously worries and calls us all, and we start looking for you. That's when we find out you didn't go with Jordan Parker, but with a man whose actual name is Joe Pharrell-Jones, a thirty-five year-old man from Rochester who has been missing for quite a while. He wasn't even a paramedic, his late mother was one, and his father is in prison for devoting to some ugly businesses.”

“What the fuck, Vanessa, I think the name would sound familiar...”

“Not if he lied to you for months and months, pretending to be Jordan, the paramedic,” Wardle said. “I went to his flat Robin-,”

“I have been there as well,” Robin said matter-of-factly. “Nothing extraordinary about it, aside for an obsession for country music.”

“Oh he was obsessed for more than country music. His newest obsession was you,” Wardle explained. “He had a safe hidden in his closet, full of photographs of you. Walking around the street, shopping, playing with the children in the park...”

“I would've known if I was being followed and photographed,” Robin murmured. “I've been so careful since...”

“I'm sorry, sweetie,” Vanessa said sad for her. “But you didn't realize. The photos were all taken from afar, but you're easily recognizable.”

“And Robin,” Wardle clenched his jaw for a moment. “The photos include some of a nature I didn't have the heart to disclose to Cormoran. In some of them you're asleep, Robin. And... well... not wearing a pyjama.” Robin's eyes widened.

“Fuck,” she blurted out. “Fuck! Swear to me you didn't look much.”

“I swear on my parents that the minute I realized what it was about I didn't look further,” Wardle assured. Lucy, Nick and Ilsa listened attentive, and looked serious and in a bad temper.

“I'm going to cut his dick off when I see him,” Robin snapped. “I swear to God, I didn't even sleep with him until last night, if I had known he was a creep...”

“Cormoran's already taken care of him, trust me,” Vanessa said. “You know how sensitive he is with awful men making bad use of innocent mothers, understandably. So you two were driving and at some point, we think he made you stop the car in the A1245, at a rest-spot by a circus. The doctors found a potent drug in your blood that he could've injected on you and you would've dropped unconscious in a moment, I guess he must've caught you by surprise,” Robin observed with a shocked expression. “Don't worry, he didn't rape you or anything. He was just obsessed about you, we don't think he planned on hurting you at all, he just wanted you for himself.”

“Our theory is that Cormoran and the children became too much of a threat for his goals of being with you and only you forever, so he kidnapped you to take you away from them,” said Wardle. “Our investigation took us to Rushley Island in Little Wakering, right by Southend-on-Sea, where your Land Rover appeared, things still inside, so we put-up a search team with dogs, figuring you had to be close. It's an area without forest, simply deserted countryside so, we thought it'd be easy. Cormoran joined us there, and he and Vanessa found a cabin.”

“But there was nowhere we could hide, no trees and barely bushes big enough to hide us, so we had to drop to the ground and think of a plan. We had divided, so it was just us,” Vanessa continued. “Cormoran thought if he took my walkie-talkie and my gun and went in, pretending to be just a guy looking for you, he could check if you and Joe were actually in that cabin and keep us informed the whole time via the walkie-talkie, while the others joined us. We didn't want to come too close because if Joe was in there, he had a privileged spot to fill our brains with bullets. Cormoran thought Joe wouldn't try to kill him, because it's not easy to kill someone and if he had never done it, it was unlikely he'd do it now, besides, he'd be in trouble having to hide a body. He thought it most likely he'd try to kidnap him. In the cabin, he found you and Joe, who pointed at him with a riffle and tried to kidnap him as well, and then to kill you both, so Cormoran had no option but to fight with him a little...”

“Long-story short, Joe's dead,” Wardle said. Vanessa bit her lip, and nodded.

“Cormoran killed Jordan?” Robin asked, in disbelief.

“Joe,” Lucy reminded her. “It was self-defence, Robin...”

“Joe wasn't the best of men,” Vanessa explained. “Look, you can bite Cormoran's head off later, maybe. But you should keep in mind that Joe kidnapped you and was willing to kill anyone who stood between him and you, and if Cormoran hadn't found you, he would've taken you with him and we would've never seen you again.”

“Fuck...” Robin took a deep breath. She had liked Joe. More than the fact that Strike had killed his boyfriend, what weighted in her chest was the fact that Joe had done all he had done, stalked her like that, and she hadn't noticed who he was all along. It was somewhat like Laing all over again. She, again, felt vulnerable, defenceless, stupid... “It's been six years, and I've learnt nothing. How could I be so stupid twice...”

“Don't blame yourself,” Lucy squeezed her shoulder affectionately. “You're a tremendous detective, and this isn't like Laing. This guy was your boyfriend, and you're a busy mother, the kids are more your priority and looking over your shoulder the whole time. Hey, if Corm dated the bitch Charlotte is, even having done this job his whole life, it isn't so extraordinary that you fell intro the trap too and dated a dickhead.”

“I _married_ a dickhead, I should've known better,” Robin chastised herself, looking surrendered and exhausted. “Whatever... where's Cormoran? I want to make sure he's alright, he should come home with me, see the kids...”

“That's... gonna be more complicated...” Robin looked up at Lucy and suddenly noticed it. The teary eyes, the worry and tension all over her face... the things that before she had been too concussed, and too focused in other things, to notice.

“Lucy,” Robin said firmly. “Where is Cormoran?”

“Here,” Lucy replied. “Robin, he's in the theatre.” Robin's eyes widened.

“In the theatre? What? Why?” the lung transplant. What if he had needed that?

“Calm down, please, there's nothing we can do,” Lucy said gently. “Look, he had the sarcoidosis thing, that gave him pulmonary hypertension...”

“That was fixed. He was taking medication, he's getting better...”

“I know. But he's not all right yet, he's just getting there and it takes time. Thing is, he was so worried about you that he drove straight to Southend-on-Sea and forgot his meds, and then with the stress, the tension, the fighting with this dude, the cold, the humidity... the doctor thinks they made things worse, a person with lung disease developing into heart disease can only withstand so much for hours and hours without a break. His pulmonary hypertension rose up again, and...” she took a deep breath. “She's got a pulmonary edema. His right lung is full of liquid, he couldn't breathe, Vanessa and Eric said he fell unconscious in the car coming here.”

“The pulmonary hypertension and sarcoidosis have been affecting his heart and made it prone to fail, it stopped pumping blood properly and hence liquid started accumulating in his lung. They have to open-up, extract the liquid,” explained Nick softly, “they will insert a tube in his lung so the liquid comes out, and give him medication to improve heart functioning and lungs... look, it is a potentially fatal medical emergency, but he's receiving treatment, he'll be in the ICU and he's got great doctors looking after him.”

The younger woman shook her head repeatedly, as she assimilated the news and tried not to imagine her partner on a metallic theatre bed having his chest opened. She felt she needed to take control of things, to act now, to do something.

“Nick, please, could you phone your parents so I can speak to Aiden?”

With a nod, Nick pulled his mobile and was soon asking one of his parents whether Aiden could get on the phone to speak to Robin, and handing the latter his mobile. Robin waited patiently.

“Mummy!” Aiden's voice almost brought her straight to tears. “You okay!”

“Hi baby, yes I'm okay,” Robin grinned, sitting up in the bed. “How are you and Bruno? Are you having a good time?”

“Yep-yep! We're playing blocks and watching Nemo the fish, he got lost like you!”

“Yeah,” Robin imagined someone had told her she got lost and needed to be found. “But despite all the fun you're having, you and Bruno will still come with me tonight, right? So we can have letters soup and sleep all tucked in my big bed?”

“Yes! When are you coming, Mummy? I miss you, and Bruno has asked twice for you.” Her chastising tone brought a smile to Robin's lips.

“I'm in London, not far from you actually, but it's gonna take me a couple hours more, all right?”

“Okay. Is Dada coming too?”

“Your father's here with me, he's just having some discomfort with breathing, remember he's ill? So we're here chatting with the doctor and your father's going to stay here tonight so they can observe him all night and make sure he's okay. You know, like Daddy and I watch over you when you're sick. Hopefully he's feeling better in a couple days and can come home. Oh, by the way! Guess who's coming over!”

“Uh... Uncle Stephen?”

“Close, but not yet. He's coming in a few weeks though. No, today we will host Grandma and Grandpa!” she made sure to sound cheerful and unworried.

“Hurrah!” Aiden cheered. “Can they play with me?”

“I'm sure they will love to. So I will pick you up later and take you home to them, okay?”

“Okay. Mummy, can I talk to Daddy a little?”

“Not right now buddy, he will call you when he feels better okay? And I will give you a thousand kisses from him when I see you today.”

“Okay... and can you tell him something from me then?”

“Anything.”

“Uhm... you tell him... tell him we love them, Bruno and I,” Aiden said happily. “And tell him he's the best Daddy and that we hope he feels better soon.” Robin bit her lip, feeling a knot in her throat, and nodded.

“I will tell him, love. We love you too, okay? Give Bruno a big kiss from me. You're the best big sister ever.”

“I try,” Aiden said humbly. “Love you Mama.”

“You too... see you later!”

“See you!”

Robin hung up, deflated, and returned the phone to Nick, murmuring a thank you. She didn't know what else she could do.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you always for the support and your comments, which are always, even if they're only emojis or short things, very much valued and appreciated and keep my work in AO3 going.


	17. Glueing rocks

**Chapter 17:**

The rain hitting the windows strongly made Robin's eyes blink awake. She had her nose pressed against Aiden's forehead, a hand buried in her curls, and she instinctively looked down at her before doing any other movement. The little girl, three years and five months of age, was snuggled into her chest, and one of her little hands rested over her boob. She reminded her of Strike in some ways, but mostly of Leda and, sometimes, of herself. She resembled more the child she had been than the child Strike had been, although she had to admit that physically she was a lot like her father, with his hair only more graceful than his but equally dark, and also full of prettier curls, her face just as round, and her eyelashes just as long, and she was one of the tallest girls of her class, just as she had been a big baby.

Moving a little, she caught sight of Bruno, hugging her on the other side, as her right arm rested just over his shoulders and his face pressed against her chest. He looked so incredibly much like Strike at his age, as Robin had seen in photographs, only that his hair wasn't so dark, more like brown, or dirty blonde in the summer, when the light hit it a lot. His eyes were like Robin and Aiden's, she knew, only darker, but his curls were Strike's, the spiral on the crown of his head just like Strike's, he was as tall and thin as Strike at his age, and incredibly observant, hyper-aware, innocent. He had the same way his father had of looking at you with an intensity that threatened to go through your soul, and the same mouth, the same nose, and then freckles over his nose that were so unequivocally Robin's. She reflected their children had, after all, the best of both.

Robin's head rolled to face the ceiling. The noise of the rain was a lot for her concussed brain, and she felt exhausted, completely drained. The light in the room was dimly and came from the early morning sun, making her room look shades of grey as she trailed her eyes over it, stopping at the little photograph on top of the dresser. She loved having her house full of photographs and decoration, of memories and of the past that built her present, while Strike lived heavily in the day, and hardly had anything in his flat that didn't belong to the day. The photograph showed Strike sitting on the armchair of his flat, that had once been their flat, holding baby Bruno and making faces at him. Strike had always been amused with how observant Bruno was, how he looked so deeply at everything. He had been born at the flat, and later they had spent a day in observation in the hospital, because Strike pressured the nurses and doctor into making sure all was fine. He couldn't believe home-birth could actually go fine, even when so many people around him -including himself and Lucy- had been home-birthed. For Robin, it was the most natural thing in her family, everyone living so far from the hospital that they had been more comfortable just staying home.

A soft knock on the door pulled her from her thoughts and her mother's face peeked into the room. She looked tired and the seventy years she had were more evident now, with the worry she had. Her strawberry-blonde hair was now mostly white, but her eyes were unaffected by time. She was in her pyjamas, and wore her housecoat over them.

“Are you awake, love?” Linda Ellacott asked her daughter.

“Yeah,” Robin was surprised to hear her voice rather hoarse, tired.

“How are you feeling?” Linda asked coming inside and carefully sitting at the feet of her bed.

“I've got a bit of a headache, but otherwise fine,” Robin replied, moving her hands to rub her children's backs. “Did you sleep well in the inflatable mattress? I know it's shit, Cormoran says it all the time.”

“It's fine,” Linda shrugged. “Your father has made tea and pulled-out biscuits and no one's called about Cormoran yet. We've been awake for an hour or so, only.”

“Thank you. I'll be outside in a minute.”

Robin slid out of bed slowly once Linda was back downstairs, and tucked her children in bed, careful not to wake them up, putting her pillows around them to keep them from falling. She groaned as she put her house-coat on, and walked downstairs holding strongly onto the banister, as the room still spun around a little. Despite living in a loft, it was smaller than Strike's flat. Strike's flat had been bought first out of convenience and necessity, too big for just Strike, quite expensive, but right over the office, and was needed with urgency. Then later, when they had found out Aiden was coming, it had only made sense for Robin to move into the flat, that was a good size for a growing family. Over time, their family had grown even more, and the four could very comfortably be in that flat. When they had separated, Robin had looked for a small place with three bedrooms, the three of them quite tiny, one toilet, one bathroom, and the stairs had made it seem just somewhat bigger than it actually was.

“Hi,” Robin saluted her parents, who sat on the sofa drinking tea. “I've left the kids to sleep upstairs. I was thinking, we could move to Cormoran's flat. It's quite big, you could have the studio with an actual bed.”

“Whatever suits you better, darling,” Michael said.

“Yes. The kids will be happy, they've lived there all their lives, they like it more than this loft,” said Robin, nodding for herself.

Robin stood-up to fetch a brownie for breakfast, although she wasn't too hungry, and took her mobile that was charging on the kitchen counter. She was just coming back to her parents when her mobile rang and she took the call. It was a short call, and she flopped on the sofa afterwards.

“Who was it?” asked her father.

“Cormoran's doctor. They said he's awake and feeling much better,” said Robin. “I can go visit him at any point, I'm his next of kin. He's got a tube between his ribs to extract liquid from his lung, but he is otherwise fine, with medications for his heart and lung. Didn't need heart surgery. Hospital stay of a week or so.”

“Well that's great news isn't it?” asked Robin's mother.

“Yeah. I just don't know how am I going to explain to our children.” Said Robin.

“You tell them the truth,” said Michael. “That's always easier.”

“Sit with them, calmly. There's no hurry.” Added Linda.

Robin agreed, and once the children were awake, they got dressed and helped Robin pack her things, as well as the children's, to move into Strike's flat for the time being. The children were excited. They didn't need to pack much, because the children kept most of their things at Strike's, with their bedrooms there being bigger, and Robin and Strike both kept part of their things at the other's place for emergencies. Once settled at the flat, Robin dressed-up to visit Strike. She was conscious of her paleness and the scar on her forehead, but wanted to look extra pretty so Strike wouldn't worry. Then, she prepared to face her children, who were playing on the rug of Aiden's bedroom with their grandparents.

“Hey guys, can I talk with you for a bit?” Robin said smiling at her children. They nodded and Robin sat between them on the rug. “We need to talk about Daddy and a few things more.”

“Is he coming home?” Aiden asked with unhidden excitement.

“In a week. The doctor has called me and said he will be all right, but that he needs to stay for a week in the hospital so they can keep a close eye on him. Daddy's got a disease that makes it hard to breathe sometimes, and although it is usually fine, lately, with the cold temperatures and all, it has complicated a little, which is why he's not feeling okay. But in a week, when he's back home, he'll be better and ready to play again.”

“Okay,” Aiden nodded. Bruno chewed on a toy, and nodded. Robin gently took the toy out of his mouth. “Mummy, do we live back here again?”

“For a few weeks. I was thinking we could stay here with Daddy and help him fully recover. I guess when he's back he'll still be tired and low on strength, and he could probably appreciate our help and our company, don't you think?” they both nodded. “And then there's Christmas, Grandpa and Grandma will stay with us for Christmas, and here is bigger for all of us. We'll put Stephen and Jenny in my flat with Cousin Samantha, and Uncle Martin and Uncle Jon will come as well and stay in a hotel, does that sound fun?” both kids nodded and cheered excitedly.

At first the plan had been different, to stay at Robin's, but given the circumstances and the fact that Bruno was doing much better and walking around, Robin figured this would work just as well, if not better. A man like Strike, with lung disease, shouldn't be in her flat, up and down stairs all day long.

“Will Jordan come for Christmas?” Aiden asked. They had been lucky enough to never meet Jordan, yet Robin felt a pang in her chest at the mention of his name. He had been a good friend and it was still difficult to gulp his death, and the truth about the man.

“No,” Robin shook her head. “Jordan and I are no longer friends. You won't have to meet him.” Aiden frowned.

“Why isn't he your friend no more?”

“Because,” Robin said. “He was a bad man and he lied to me and treated me wrong. He was the one who made me get lost yesterday, and Daddy had to yell at him very hard for being bad.”

“Bad man!” Bruno said with enthusiasm. “We don't like.” He added, shaking his finger. Robin giggled and nodded.

“That's right Bru, we don't like bad men.”

“Daddy's a good man,” Aiden concluded, kissing her mother's cheek. “No worry Mummy, we treat you well.”

“You treat me fantastically well,” Robin kissed her forehead. “Now I'm going to see Daddy, okay?”

Promising to give their father a thousand kisses from the whole gang, Robin grabbed her purse and called a taxi, as her parents made her swear she wouldn't drive nor risk public transport alone when she was recovering from her head. The taxi worked pretty comfortably for her. Now the day was inexplicably sunny, after all the rain of the early day, and had this shiny light post-storm that Robin quite fancied.

“Hi,” Robin said gently, smiling as she entered Strike's bed. He had just been moving to a room, and an empty bed next to his indicated he would be solo for now.

“Hi,” Strike smiled at her. He looked tired and old, but happy to see her nevertheless. He was surrounded by machines and had an oxygen tube by his nostrils. His voice sounded tired and hoarse. “How are you doing?”

“I'm fine,” Robin replied, leaning over the bed to kiss his cheek. “The children told me to give you at least a million kisses.” Strike snorted a laugh.

“God bless them,” Robin kissed his forehead and again his cheek, and was satisfied enough, smiling at him as she cleaned the lipstick off his face with her hand. “How are they?”

“They're okay, my parents came so they're having a playing party. We went to your place, I figured changing plans would be easier under the circumstances. Bruno's wound is pretty much healed-up.”

“He bounces back like a lighting, that guy,” Strike admitted. “So... I'm sorry I killed your boyfriend. Won't do it again.” It was such an odd sentence, that Robin found herself sniggering, and shook her head.

“I don't doubt it. But don't be sorry, you did the right thing and if you think about it, my boyfriend was never a Joe as far as I authorized. Thank you, Cormoran. You're a good man, and I'm only quoting your daughter.” Strike beamed, and for a moment he looked ten years younger.

“She said that?”

“Oh, yeah. She's your biggest fan, you know it. So, how are you feeling?” Strike half-shrugged and smiled timidly.

“I'm drugged as fuck,” Strike admitted. “So I don't feel anything more than... some pressure in my chest. Doc said it's normal, and will go away. Wardle passed by shortly before you came... apparently the documents have to include the fact that I killed Joe, so I'm likely to be called to testify in a jury, but there shouldn't be a jury because you can't judge a dead man.”

“They can judge you for murder,” Robin pointed-out.

“That's true,” Strike said, nodding. “Pity. But Wardle said they won't, 'cause there is no one to press charges.”

“Good news then.”

Robin pulled a dark blue armchair closer to the bed and sat there.

“I'm bored as fuck,” Strike murmured, looking at the ceiling. He wore a hospital gown and the bedsheets were up to his chest.

“Why don't you take a nap?”

“Robin! I've taken three naps today, and it's only eleven in the morning. We both know I love naps, but there are only so many I can take,” Robin snorted a laugh and he looked at her softly. “Tell me about work?”

“I called Mrs Clarkton, let her know all that's happened in very superficial lines, and we did the interview on the phone. She says her boss had a romance with a woman who could be our client's mother, it fits. I don't think we'll be able to get much more than that. And the other cases are being handled.”

“I see,” Strike nodded. There was a moment of silence and he contemplated her with soft, gentle eyes. “How's your head?”

“The pain comes and goes,” replied Robin. “I'm running from loud noises and am not allowed to drive for two weeks, and aside from some dizziness and some memory loss, I'm just as new.”

“Concussions suck... not your first one though.”

“Yeah. The doctor said I've got a hard skull.”

“I always said you were hard-headed,” Strike joked, making her smile a little bit.

“Aiden wanted to bring you Alfred, but toys aren't allowed here,” Robin commented casually.

“She's got such a fat heart,” he said. “I... I kind of expected you to be sad. About Joe, I mean. You had been dating for quite a long time, hadn't you?”

“Few months,” Robin replied, shrugging. She bit her lip and shook her head. “If I'm honest, I'm way angrier than sad. I'm sad for me because I keep falling on the same bullshit and because I cared about him and now he's gone, but I'm happy he's gone. I'm happy to have the truth and to know he was a bad man and he got what he deserved. And then just so angry.”

“How can you feel so much with a concussion?” Strike joked to lighten the mood. Robin snorted and smiled small.

“Weird, isn't it? I guess I feel it in my chest more than... rationalize it. I think I'm going to start doing boxing, you know? I think I could let off some steam.”

“It helps for that. Even I get angry thinking of how unlucky you are with men. Seems live every tosser there is goes straight to you, like bees to the honey.”

“Spanner was nice,” Robin murmured. “You were nice.”

“I wasn't nice enough,” Strike said. “Nicest thing I did was put my best part of DNA into those kids, instead of the worst of it. Even my curls look gracious and pretty on them, don't know how _that_ happened.” Robin chuckled.

“They're pretty damn cute indeed,” she agreed, nodding. “D'you know the first thing I've done, on my way here?”

“Glare at a taxi driver?”

“Good one, but no,” Robin rolled eyes, smiling at him while she played with the extremes of her scarf. “I went for the morning-after pill. Because the night before this whole mess I had no better idea than to fuck that son of a bitch, and even though we used condoms, I personally checked them for leaks, and I took like a pill then, and another the morning-after and another with my second breakfast that day, the idea that somehow a part of him is making a child inside of me makes me feel like puking.”

“Pregnancy will do that to you,” Strike said to enlighten the mood, and Robin snorted a laugh and slapped his hand softly. “Sorry,” he smiled, “you made it so easy.”

“You know what angers me the most though?”

“My sense of humour?”

“Second place, yes,” Robin joked, smirking. He smiled at her, and then she got serious. “What makes me absolutely furious is to think that I couldn't squash his balls myself. That once again, I needed you to save the day. And not just because of feminism, and girl-power and whatnot... it angers me because if I didn't need you so much every time something shitty happens, you could focus on our children, on your own recovery, you wouldn't have to... babysit me. And your life wouldn't have put at risk. Thinking that _my_ boyfriend could've shot you to death with a riffle, makes me...” she clenched her jaw and shook her head.

Strike sighed and looked at her for a long moment without saying anything. She looked deflated.

“Robin, you do get yourself out of trouble on your own. Even better, you hardly get yourself into trouble. Laing? You punched him. When you got into the taxi accident? That was on me. Matthew, you got out of it on your own, Raphael... if you hadn't been so damn smart and quick-minded, there would've been nothing for me to do. You would've been in the bottom of the channel before I could do anything. And when you went into labour with Bruno, prematurely, with no one expecting it, no one there for you, no one able to reach you fast enough... you did that on your own. You were literally alone in the flat, with a year-and-a-half old girl and a boy coming, and when I finally got there Aiden was watching the telly as nothing had happened and I found you in the tube right as he came out. All on your own. If anything, this is the very first time I rescue you from anything, and only because he drugged you. Chances are you would've eventually wiggled yourself free, if experience is anything to judge from.”

She looked at him serious for a moment, as his words sank in, and then she grinned at him.

“If you put it that way, it does sound quite awesome...”

“How else would I put it?” Strike snorted. “You've got the biggest pair of ovaries I know. You're a force to be reckoned with. Every time Aiden finds a way to convince me to give her biscuits when she shouldn't have them, I know she's using the Robin vein.” Robin laughed.

“You're exaggerating.”

“Not at all...” Strike closed his eyes, tired. “If I'm the glue that keeps our family together, you're the rock that keeps us standing.”

  
  



	18. Daddy's caretakers

**Chapter 18:**

“I'm home!”

Shouting that into the flat gave Robin a strong deja-vu feeling, as she had shout it so much when she had lived there. But even though the situation was entirely different, the result didn't vary; two children ran fast as a lighting to her legs, the youngest ending of sitting against her hips and held with one arm and the other walking next to her holding hands as they came into the living room.

“Hi!” she received a choir of salutes. Linda and Michael sat around the table eating dinner with Nick, Ilsa and Lucy, and the three Herbert children played nearby.

“Had I known we had so many visits, I would've hurried back a little,” Robin smiled, leaning to kiss Lucy and Ilsa on the cheek. She felt in a great mood after visiting Strike and checking for herself he was recovering just fine. “I thought you'd come.” She added looking at Lucy.

“I was going to come, but then I figured better wait until you gave us the summary, in case he wasn't feeling up for visits.”

Robin sat and let her parents bring her dinner, filling her plate while Bruno got comfortable on her lap and Aiden went back to playing.

“Where are the boys?” Robin asked. Lucy's sons had started calling her Aunty Robin when she had been pregnant with Aiden, and even if her relationship with Strike had changed, she still considered them her nephews, as they were still her children's cousins, and cared about them.

“They were just here with Greg,” Lucy said. “But they have to get up early tomorrow for a football match, so Greg offered to drive them home so I could stay and wait for you. So how's my brother?”

“He's holding up,” Robin replied. “Bored as hell, he says, and sick of being stuck on a bed already, but in good spirits, cracking jokes and all.”

“Oh, thank God.”

“He's not in any pain? I thought he had a tube stuck to his chest,” Linda commented, surprised.

“He's very highly drugged with painkillers for now. Ilsa, what are you doing for Christmas?”

“Lunch at the Herberts,” Ilsa replied, her plate already finished, sitting next to her husband and holding hands with him over his lap. “Here in London. Last year we went to Cornwall, so...”

“Our turn,” Nick chuckled. “Mum's going to make a giant cake because she's been taking baking classes. Oggy will be home by Christmas, right?”

“He'll be home next weekend,” Robin assured, nodding. “We should all meet for Christmas, if Corm's feeling up for it, which I bet he will. Bruno baby, does your belly hurt, all good?” she asked, remembering to check on her boy.

“I good,” Bruno replied, nodding.

“Awesome,” Robin rubbed his curls gently. “These two need bathing and bed, I'll take care of it.”

“Why don't you stop five minutes, eat your dinner in peace and then we'll see?” Michael smiled gently at her. “Tomorrow you can comment with us the nursery schedule and on Monday we'll take care of their routine while you work and all of that.”

“You are life-savers, really!”

“And we'll visit Corm, so don't worry about that,” added Ilsa.

It was inevitable to spend a good portion of dinner just planning for Christmas, as it was right around the corner, along with other festivities, and when they were finally alone, Robin put both children in the bathtub and sat to help wash them, to later put them in bed. As she stretched alone in her big bed, she thought of Strike, sleeping alone in his room, bored and lonely, and she felt nostalgic for him. She took her mobile and shot him a quick text;

' _Just put the kids to sleep, alone in bed now. Wanted to wish you good night and sweet dreams xoxo'_

Unexpectedly, Strike's answer came quickly.

' _Sounds great! Deeply jealous. Yknow, back in the day 'alone in bed' wouldve made this night way more interesting.'_

Robin's jaw dropped and she giggled, blushing.

_'You're so dirty! What would you daughter say?'_

_'Thank you for making me, Dada?'_

She pressed her mouth against the pillows to avoid laughing, and felt a pang of sadness all of the sudden, staring at her phone. Strike and her had been like that a lot, back in the day. He had carried her bride style into their house after her first ultrasound, and they had fallen, laughing, on the sofa, he had brought breakfast in bed and jokes into the breakfast, and she had lured him to sleep playing with his curls and spooned him some nights, when she had felt like hugging a teddy bear. When had they lost themselves in the way?

' _I'm sorry_ '. Robin wrote, without quite knowing what pushed her to do so.

' _What for?'_ came Strike's reply.

' _For not fighting harder for us. For deciding we wouldn't work. For moving on. For Joe. For our children suffering because we're not together and knowing that if only I wanted to, things would be very different. I know you must think I'm a royal bitch, and I'm sorry, because even now, even when I miss what we had, even when I care the world about you, I still think we're better off not being romantically involved. You and the kids have all the right to be mad at me. I just hope that maybe with time, you all will understand I did this for all of us, because I truly think it's what will make all of us happy. I know it's unfair that one person's decision (even when back in the day it was a two-people agreement) dictates the life of four people. I'm sorry.'_

For a few minutes, Strike didn't reply. Robin had already snuggled back in bed, looking away from her laptop, and assumed that he had fallen asleep, or decided not to answer, when her phone buzzed and, reaching to get it, she saw it was Strike.

' _Take it easy, Ellacott. Being parent is not easy, we trying our best here, right? Just because I wish for a different thing doesn't mean i'm right and you're wrong. If us staying together just because I insisted had ended-up on all 4 of us being unhappy, I would've never forgiven myself. With your option, at least we can still stay together somehow right? That's what matters. The rest is just... the icing on the cake. And I've never minded icing much. You my best friend, as long as that stays that way... ill live.'_

The next day, when Robin went to visit Strike, facing the below-zero temperatures just to get there, she was surprised to find Strike wasn't in the great mood he had been the day before. He looked drained, and could barely hold a conversation, so Robin resolved to sit there and hold his hand while he slept. She messaged the others not to come, warning he wasn't in the mood for visits and was just sleeping all day long, and that way she made sure he would have the space to rest the way he should.

For lunch, the young detective acquired a sandwich at the cafeteria down below, that she ate watching Strike snore peacefully. That way they passed the hours. At one point, Robin was just reading 'The Guardian' on her phone, when Strike called her attention murmuring something in his sleep. She put the phone away and leaned over the bed to try to understand.

“What did you say, Corm?” she asked, unsure of if his murmuring had been asleep or awake.

“Don't leave me...” his raspy voice came, and it was barely a murmur. “Please...”

“Cormoran...”

“Don't wanna be... alone...” his eyelids opened just a little and Robin saw his dark eyes search and then his eyelids close. She wasn't sure he had been talking asleep.

“Don't worry, Cormoran,” she pressed her soft lips on his temple. “I won't leave you alone.”

She observed him in silence for a few minutes wondering if now he was deep asleep again, but he proved not to be, as his voice, a mere hoarse whisper, broke the silence again.

“I'll be a better man...”

She frowned, wondering what he was dreaming about, and wishing she could take his pain away.

On the second weekend of December, Strike was sent back home. It had been a week of worry, tension, stress, and intense observation, as no one could quite relax about his disease, that was still there, and that would still need treatment for what was likely to be years. As the days passed, Robin had been observing that the man in question was starting to retreat into himself. She could only visit when she wasn't working or busy with their children, but she still noticed how he stopped joking around, how he was more and more non-talkative, quieter, and when asked about it he'd always say he was just tired, but by that point in their relationship Robin could practically smell his lies, and she didn't like them one bit.

Once he was at home, things didn't seem to change much. Although he was as ever polite and kind to Robin's family, and they were caring and loving with him as always, and although he was the same perfect, loving Dad he had always been and treated his children as if they were VIP, he still tried to socialize the least, and unless it was the children asking, occasions in which he would make an effort, he didn't want to eat much, watch TV much, read the football section on the newspapers, or even hear about work, which was what, three days after he was home, made Robin call his doctor to make sure everything was going all right, but the doctor didn't see her reasons to worry, and explained calmly that it was normal for someone who had a lung disease and had had surgery, to be tired, and to not feel like doing anything.

“I could give you a shave,” Robin suggested to Strike one of those days, as he lied on the sofa and contemplated the TV, turned on, with such passiveness that his pupils weren't even moving. “You've grown quite the beard...”

“No,” Strike's soft voice replied. “I like it this way.”

“Okay. I suppose it makes you look younger,” she offered with a kind smile that he didn't correspond. She hadn't seen him smile in days, and worried he had a problem with her, she had asked everyone else, but everyone agreed he wasn't the same.

“Daddy, can I do your make-up?” asked Aiden, holding a big, blue plastic purse with pink flowers on it. She had her own plastic make-up set, and she always pretended the plastic tools actually did something. Robin supposed her imagination was so strong she probably felt that it really did do something. She was ready to ask their daughter to please let her father rest, when she saw Strike's pupils move to Aiden and his expression brighten, and the words died in her lips.

“Of course Poppet, make sure I look pretty.”

“You always look handsome!” Aiden claimed matter-of-factly, and excitedly set to work, passing plastic lipsticks over his thick lips, caressing his skin with a plastic brush, and touching his eyelids with her fingers after pressing them against plastic squares of colours. She even pulled her little hairbrush and brushed his beard and his curls. “Sooo handsome! Like a prince!”

“Well thank you very much Poppet, you're the sweetest,” Strike reached to kiss her cheek, and smiled proudly at her. Aiden did receive as many smiles as always, and so did Bruno. But Robin saw the transformation every time the children left after a moment with Strike. She saw his smile vanish, his wince of pain as he tried to feel comfortable lying down, his exhaustion, and how big of an effort he did only for his children.

This time was nothing different, the moment Aiden turned around to play cars with Bruno, and Robin could've sworn his face grew three shades paler. The doctor had warned it would be a slow and painful recovery, that it could take days until he could even sit-up, that the smallest of things would be a huge effort for him at first, but it somehow didn't mean anything unless you saw it.

“I'll get on with lunch, kids, can I trust you will take care of Daddy?”

Both toddlers nodded firmly.

“We care Daddy!” Bruno shouted. A shadow of a smile appeared in Strike's lips, and he closed his eyes, hugging himself, as he drifted back to sleep.

“Corm, come on, you've got to eat a little,” Strike's eyes opened and he saw Robin holding a fork with pasta, sitting on the floor by the sofa. She smiled softly at him, with pleading eyes, and he looked at the fork. It was the children's favourite.

“Okay,” he accepted, opening his mouth and leaning forward a little. She fed him a small bowl, all while Strike felt guiltier by the second, seeing the bags under her eyes. She worked so hard for their family. In the background, he could hear their children being loud as their grandparents had lunch with them. “Now you,” Strike said on impulse, when there was only a bit of food left in the bowl. Robin looked surprised.

“Me what?”

“Eat. You're not eating.”

“Oh, I've already eaten.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” Robin patted his lips with a napkin. “I wanted to let you sleep as much as possible before interrupting you. The kids are really just playing with dessert.” Strike nodded, and accepted another bit. “You haven't had a bath in almost a week, haven't you? I could wash you later, with a sponge.”

“You?”

“Who else?” He looked shy all of the sudden.

“But you haven't seen my thingies in forever...” he murmured timidly. Robin snorted a laugh.

“Has anything changed down there?” she asked jokingly. He shook his head. “Then I think I won't flip,” she side-smiled at his face of uncertainty. “Don't worry Cormoran, if you get excited I'll pretend nothing's happening.”

“Very funny.”

Robin giggled, and kissed his cheek, moving away to get the empty bowl to the kitchen. The place where she had kissed him burned for a while.

  
  



	19. Partners nevertheless

**Chapter 19:**

Once the children were in bed, and Strike had been sleeping all day, Robin helped him to strip-off his clothes and get naked, and with her help he was lowered into the bathtub. By this time in their relationship, Strike didn't doubt Robin's all-time affirmation that she was stronger than she looked, although the process still exhausted him tremendously. His chest wound had healed and was now a line of scar around which the side of his torso sunk a little, but inside things were still healing, slower than skin, so Robin didn't want to move him much.

Her fingers dug into his curls carefully, as she sat on the floor, and washed his hair properly. He only washed his ears and between his legs, while Robin used a sponge to brush out until the last bit of dirt from his arms, torso, legs, feet and hands, even caring for his nails, that she left clean and properly cut. She dried him in the tub with a towel as much as she could while the water abandoned the bathtub, she didn't look more than strictly necessary towards his parts, and she carefully helped him out of the bathtub and into bed, where she helped him into his pyjamas and brushed his curls. Half-asleep, he felt her tuck him into bed and press her lips against his forehead, murmuring a goodnight. She had even changed his bedsheets, and the last he smelled for the day was pure cleanliness.

In the morning, he was surprised to find Robin quietly cleaning around in his bedroom.

“Robin?” he looked at her, confused. She looked like a deer in headlights.

“Sorry! Did I wake you up?”

“No, but what are you doing?”

“Well, Aiden's in nursery, my parents took Bruno to the park, and I was working in the studio when I decided to come and check on you... and I couldn't believe the layer of dust around your room. I thought you shouldn't be breathing dust, with your lungs...” Robin looked guilty and Strike almost laughed.

“Thank you,” he said, looking around. His room had indeed known better times, but he hadn't lived there in weeks, as he had been at Robin's. “You don't have to clean my flat though, Robin. Really... you're overworking.”

“You do the same when I'm the one in bed,” Robin smiled. “How did you sleep? Want your medicine?”

“I'm good, it was fine.” Strike curled up in bed again, and closed his eyes.

He knew Robin was still cleaning very quietly because he could sometimes hear the spray of the wood polish bottle and the brush of the cloth against surfaces. Equally, she knew he wasn't asleep, because she had slept with him such an amount of times, she knew perfectly well how asleep Strike sounded.

“So,” Robin said after a while. “What's got you so sullen and sad lately?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Come on, I'm a detective, I noticed. The only ones who seem to make you smile lately are the children.”

“They're funnier than you.”

“Ha, ha,” Robin turned, seeing him smirking with the eyes closed. “Oh, there's one, journalists, come photograph it before it vanishes!”

Strike's eyes opened and he sighed.

“Can I confess something?”

“Sure,” Robin left the cleaning utensils and sat on the feet of his bed. He was staring at the ceiling.

“I haven't told anyone, but it's been a while since the last time life was any exciting for me. The children are perhaps the only things that put some excitement, because as they grow up they become boxes full of surprises. And if you add the fact that I've got a lung disease that's screwed-up my heart and they're both trying to recover, but meantime making me feel as if I hold the weight of the world in my chest, it's not too easy to smile.”

Robin moved to lie on the bed next to him, over the covers, and contemplated him silently for a few moments.

“What do you mean life isn't exciting? Being alive?”

“The day to day. It's always the same shit, Robin. I'm not used to routine. My whole life has been a constant adventure, living in one place or another every few months, meeting new people all the time, making new friends constantly... the army was more of the same. To me, my childhood isn't something to be sad about because poor thing had to make friends all the time... yeah it sucked sometimes, yeah, I craved stability sometimes, and having my own room for years and years... but I got used to what I had, it was what was normal for me, I didn't know anything else. Lucy, she left it at fourteen, since she was fourteen she had the chance to look for stability, and she had always craved it. She never got used to things like I did. But I never left it. I was in my thirties by the time I left the army. Over thirty years without stability, without my own same room forever, without the same friends and neighbours all the time. That's the hardest when you come back. People thought it was the leg, the lack of action... and yes, sure, but the worst is... having so much stability. It bores me.”

“I can't believe you miss the crazy. You've always said you wanted the kids to have it different, as if what you had was a bad thing.”

“Men coming and going was a bad thing. Drugs. Dirt. Squats... of course I wish better for them. It's not those things that I miss... and I admit what I have is great. What I have was my goal. But I always thought for fighting for years for this, it'd be greater. It's just... I hardly travel anymore. The cases all seem the same, we haven't had anything as exciting as Raphael or Laing in ages... it's just mistrustful people wanting us to watch their partners, constantly. And then I get home and what? If the kids are around, sure one can get entertained with their routine, and they always make you laugh and do something stupid to keep you entertained. But if not... this is just an empty, silent flat, the whole day long. At first it was the coolest but... I've lived here for years... it's quiet and lonely and boring.”

She looked at him curiously for a long time. He had ran out of energy and looked tired, staring at the room with bored eyes.

“I could kill someone to give you a high-profile case,” Robin offered. Strike snorted a laugh.

“I appreciate it,” Strike said looking kindly at her.

“Now seriously... how can I help?”

“You've done enough. Seriously. Don't worry. I'll be just fine, the moment I heal up, it'll be all right.”

Robin didn't trust him much with that, but she didn't push and decided to just wait and see what happened with a bit more time. So the days passed and Strike made an effort to at least seem better, even if he felt the same inside, but deciding to enjoy his children, knowing that for a while, no one would take them from him. It became common for Robin to find them asleep together, or playing together. One day, she even found that Bruno had built a bridge with blocks over Strike's ankle as he slept.

“I just have three children,” Robin commented one day while doing Christmas shopping with Ilsa. “Poor thing is just miserable all the time except around them, I don't know what else to do.”

“Shouldn't he have healed-up by now?”

“Oh, he has. Well, from surgery at least, and the medication is helping a lot, but emotionally he's just... sick of the routine. The children break it a little for him, but still.”

“And how are _you_?” inquired Ilsa, stopping to contemplate whether a bath basked was a good idea of her mother-in-law or not. “You got kidnapped by your boyfriend.”

“Still angry,” Robin shrugged. “But somehow when I get home and look at the family... it vanishes. At the end of the day all that matters is family.”

“Wise conclusion. Haven't you thought...?” Ilsa continued walking down the aisle next to her, as they looked around the store. “Perhaps what Corm's really suffering for is one more Christmas single? With the dreams you said you heard him have and all...”

“Could be,” Robin sighed. “I just wish I could help.”

Christmas Eve was always a complicated night with the hyper-excited kids. Bruno didn't quite understand what was going on yet, but Aiden did and she was dying for Santa Claus to come. The tree had been put up just days before, with Strike tiredly doing a minimal part and letting the kids do most of it, under the vigilance of adults. That's why the decorations were mismatched, but no one cared much; it added charm. Strike, who had never bought a Christmas tree before Aiden's birth, found himself amazed by the children's excitement about it.

“I don't wanna go to bed, I wanna say hi to Santa!” Aiden said running around the living room. Robin had just gone to put Bruno in the crib after he had passed out on her. “I ought to say thank you for the presents.”

“I will tell him you said thank you,” Strike argued from the sofa, where he sat with his children's amused grandparents. “Come on Denie, to bed. Now. It's past ten, you're not going to want to get up tomorrow.”

“But Daddy!” Aiden gave him her best pout. She was wearing a Christmas pyjama and looked like the most adorable little elf. “I've never seen Santa, why can you see him and I can't?”

Strike sighed, seeing her pout and her sad blue eyes, and patted his lap, for her to jump on it, which she did without breaking her sad face.

“Santa's not going to come, love,” Strike said softly. Aiden's eyes got shocked.

“What? Why? I was a good girl!”

“You are the best girl, and you will get presents because of it,” Strike assured. “Thing is, there aren't enough hours in the night for Santa to go to the houses of every single person in the world, even with his magic. Nowadays, Santa, has a bunch of elves who work all night to bring the presents, and as nice and funny as the elves are, they're rather... well... ugly. Could be scary for a child.”

“I don't scared!” Aiden affirmed raising a finger. Linda giggled.

“Oh I know you're super brave,” Strike nodded. “Thing is elves aren't. They are never around children and they are so terrified of them, so shy! In fact, they try to never come in contact with a human being. They're so shy, they would cry terribly if seen in public. That's why Santa always sends a letter to every parent, asking us to please make sure children are in bed when they come, so they don't get scared and sad.”

“Show me the letter?”

“Sweetheart, I threw it away already, I'm sorry. I will see if I have any old one from another year tomorrow, all right? And show you.” Aiden frowned and looked thoughtful.

“So if I stay awake... the elves will get sad and cry?” Strike nodded. “I don't want for them to get so sad...”

“Then go to bed. We will all go to bed too, Mummy and I have never seen them either. We'll give them some privacy to work, okay?”

“Okay. So you don't know how they are either?”

“No. But once I heard they were very ugly, and super tiny. I read it somewhere,” Strike shrugged. “What I read said they were so tiny, you might not even know you were looking at one. Like butterflies.”

“Ohh,” Aiden looked amazed, and nodded. “Okay. Goodnight Daddy, Grandma and Grandpa.”

“Goodnight love,” Michael kissed her cheek and Linda too.

“Come on little elf, let's get you to bed,” Strike got up and followed the child to the room. It took six stories for the excited girl to fall asleep, but finally it was done and Strike tucked her, and got out of the room. Robin was with her parents drinking hot chocolate.

“Mum and Dad told me the giant lie you told our daughter,” said Robin amused.

“It worked,” said Strike. “She can hate me when she's eighteen.”

“Is that what your Mum told you about Santa?” Linda asked, chuckling. “It was a good story.”

“Oh, not at all,” Strike snorted a laugh, sitting with them. “My mother said Santa only came to good children, and disobeying children weren't good ones, so we better go to bed when she told us to. It was better in St. Mawes, Uncle Ted said Santa came by boat, and if he saw awake children at home he would get back in the boat and get away. Try that in the middle of London, Aiden was so worried this morning about where was Santa going to park...”

After a few laughs and small talk, Robin and Strike worked to get the presents out of the kitchen cabinets where they had been stored and under the tree, and closed the living room door, heading to bed. Robin had slept with Aiden, who had a drawer under her bed from where another bed came, while Strike's wound was healing, but now he insisted she took the other half of his bed, the one in which they had slept together so many times.

In the morning and as usual, Aiden had jumped on their bed shouting 'Merry Christmas' with all the force of her lungs, and Strike had to tackle her down and tickle her until tears of laughter came to her eyes, in order to calm her down, and Robin, after observing the scene for a moment, feeling her chest so full of happiness, went to get Bruno. Aiden was in charge of waking-up Robin's parents, and since Robin's brothers weren't in the flat, they didn't have to wait for them to run for the tree. The two children had ripped away their presents' wrappings before no one could stop them.

“Well, Mr Strike,” Robin clinked her tea mug with his. “One year more, we've done it.” She said sitting next to him on the rug as they watched the children pay with their grandparents.

“Indeed,” Strike nodded. “I've made a decision.”

“You're not going to be bored with life anymore?”

“I'm going to date again, next year,” Strike said looking at Robin. The news, for some reason, made Robin's heart ache for a moment, and she looked intensely at him. He was serious. “I think part of the reason why I'm so...” he shrugged. “Dissatisfied is because I'm stuck in the past. Being with you made me happy. Our family, despite the fights, despite the routines... I liked that. I love when my turn to be with them comes-up. And I guess I thought it wouldn't be so different, because we still spend so much time together... but this depresses me, Robin. I haven't had sex or a simple kiss in over a year, I miss waking-up in bed snuggled with someone, I miss dating, I miss intimacy, I miss sharing my life with someone who gets things. Someone who shares a home with me, someone that makes hours feel like seconds... I like that. Even if it's not too serious, you know? I liked what I had with Elin, or Lorelei. And if you don't want for us to be together anymore, and over a year later is still your last word on it then... I won't fight for it anymore. I'll let go, just like you have. I'm forty-three, and I won't spend the rest of my life alone, you know? Who knows, perhaps there's still someone out there who's supposed to stay with me forever, or at least for a while. Someone who likes children.” He shrugged, and smiled at her, even if her face had gotten rigid. “It could be fun!” With a new brightness in his eyes, he got up and went to play with the kids. For Robin, it felt like a jar of cold water had been thrown on her.

  
  



	20. Separation

**Chapter 20:**

After that unexpected announcement, strangely Strike's mood seemed to improve. It was as if admitting out-loud that he was ready to move-on and get his life back in track filled him with enormous optimism and joy, and he became the life of the party, even if he was still sick and tired, but unwilling to let that ruin the holidays. Robin, on the contrary, had a hard time to grin. She felt selfish. Why shouldn't she be happy that he was moving on? She had, after all. But somehow the idea that no one was going to fight for them anymore broke her heart. The idea that even Strike had given up. Somehow, all that time, knowing that he was still dreaming with them back together had been like a safe net, a hope she hadn't quite abandoned, even as she dated Joe.

They had Christmas lunch with the whole family, and at night they went with them all together to see London with all the decorations at night, and as Strike lifted Bruno up in the air against the snow, both laughing, Robin felt a pang of sadness in her chest for the future that waited for her children. These things wouldn't happen so often, as much as they wanted to. They had refused to admit it, but their future partners wouldn't always stand for Christmases with always the same side of the family so the parents could be together with their children. So no one had to choose whose parent was missed each year. They were going to ruin it. This could be the very last Christmas they'd spend together.

“I've never stopped loving him,” she confessed to Lucy, as both girls stood watching the kids play in the snow with some adults, while the others retreated into Lucy's house in Bromley, running from the cold.

“No way,” Lucy looked at her frowning. “Come on, Robin... what about Jordan, Joe, or whoever he was?”

“A distraction, that's what he was. I liked him a lot, but I've always loved Corm more than...” Robin clenched her jaw and shook her head. “He's the man of my life. I just thought that if I insisted hard enough that we weren't meant to be, that we didn't belong together, that we'd be happier apart, eventually I wouldn't love him anymore.”

“Lie until it's true,” Lucy murmured. Robin nodded, sadly. “Oh, Robin... and now he's ready to move forward.”

“The worst part is, I have no right to fight for us. Because then, it'll all go to hell again. We'll ruin each other's lives.”

“Robin,” Lucy put a hand on the small of her back. “Listen, okay? You two had a really shitty amount of months, but everything was shitty then. Ted's cancer, Jon's fall... it was months and months until we knew Ted would live, months and months until we knew Jon would walk again. Today last year, Ted's cancer was just starting to be on remission, he was completely bald! You two didn't have the best foundation because things started with you pregnant, and when something doesn't have a good foundation, it's doomed to crumble, Robin. It happens. You need a good foundation to resist such terrible storms. You know when I think you two managed a good foundation?”

“When?”

“This whole year. The minute you had to learn to be independent parents and work your arses to keep your family together and your children happy even when you two weren't really together, and you had to fight for your friendship like never before, and deal with Corm's disease, with Bruno's appendicitis, with your boyfriend... the minute you had no option but to stay together no matter what, you learnt how to become parents and family partners. It's like at the office. You didn't become such amazing partners in one day, it took so long, months and months of hard work... and you don't become romantic partners because you sleep with someone and have a child. You become so when you have to face the struggles of parenthood even when you're all alone. You did it just now.”

“It's true that, being alone... I appreciate much more all the things he used to do, because now I have to do it all when it's my turn. It's exhausting. And I think he understands more all what my day was like... you're right. We started too fast, didn't we? And now... we really have had time to think. Two weeks of loneliness a month and then two weeks of trying to manage alone... it really changes someone.”

“Exactly. Being a parent is hard Robin, but being a parent when you don't even know how living with the other parent and facing everything there is together, is even harder. You underestimated the level of difficulty.”

“So you think now... we could work?”

“I think now you're ready to start building the Big Ben. You have the foundation. Start slowly, go up from there, take your time.”

Robin looked at Strike, thrown on the ground making a snow angel with Aiden and Bruno, and made her choice. She was getting her family back together for Christmas.

. . .

A few days later, and with everything planned, Robin proposed to her parents that they'd stay with the kids just for a few hours, they could take them somewhere fun, see a film, anything they wanted, and then she went to find Strike, who was downstairs at the office sorting some paperwork. Robin grinned, feeling so much love for that man, and realized it was a relief to just be able to feel that instead of chastising herself for it. She walked cheerfully towards him, and got on her knees on the floor, facing him as he sat by his desk. His eyes immediately looked at her, surprised.

“What are you doing?” Strike asked. “Don't you untie my shoes uh? I know they look messy, let it be...”

“Cormoran Blue Strike,” Robin said, ignoring his comment and taking his hand between hers. Strike frowned. “Would you go on a romantic date with me tonight? Just you and I, my parents babysit.”

“What?” Strike's frown deepened. “Do you think this is funny, is this some kind of joke?” Robin blinked, astonished. She hadn't been expecting that reaction.

“No, I'm totally serious. Corm, I love you. I always have, I just thought the more I denied it, eventually it'll come true... I... I thought we'd never be happy together. But lately I've been thinking that maybe you've been right all along, when you said maybe we needed to be apart then but now we could make things work, that now is our time. You said it, I didn't want to listen and now I admit it, I think you were right all along.”

Strike clenched his jaw and he stood up and moved away from her as if she had a contagious illness. Robin scowled and stood up, and he faced the window, pressing his knuckles against his lips, thoughtful and moody.

“Why did you have to do this?” Strike snapped, turning around to face her angrily. “I pursued you a bunch of times! And you always rejected me! Why is it, that the minute I decide to move on you have to do this and make it all way more complicated for me, uh?!”

“What are you talking about? Who cares when it happens, shouldn't we be happy we've both reached an agreement?”

“No! Because we haven't!” Strike puffed. “Damn it Robin, I've got a date tonight... and it's not with you.”

Robin's jaw dropped and she looked down.

“You're seeing someone else? Do I know her?”

“Coco.”

“Coco?! April's friend? What?!” Strike shrugged.

“We slept together again, a couple days ago. She visited me in the hospital sometimes, we started talking... she's sexy as hell, all right? And she's pretty damn good at sex.” Strike felt at the defensive, seeing the anger in her eyes.

“Of all people, you slept with Coco?”

“Who the fuck cares, Robin? I figured better do it with an old friend, she loves Aiden and Bruno, they've always gotten along, she's trustworthy, funny, nice, and beautiful, not to mention really smart, kid you not,” Strike grumbled. “You have no right to judge, at least I'm dating someone known in our circle, someone who has our trust!”

“Why her? Because she fucks you well, that's the deal?”

“No! Because she makes me feel alive, because she's great, because she doesn't care if we're serious or not, she just wants to live by the moment, like I do! She cares for me, you should be happy.”

“So you have a date tonight?!”

“Damn right. And I'm very interested in making it be a wonderful evening, I've got my best suit ironed and nothing's going to ruin tonight. If all goes well, I'll tell the kids in a few days and she'll be my plus one at the Herberts' New Year's Eve gathering.”

“Oh, bugger off, you can't do that,” Robin looked at him with hurt eyes, her heart hammering. “You love me! Does she know you love me? You should cancel that date and go out with me instead...”

“I'm not your second dish! You rejected me! Time after time, and you have absolutely no right to tell me what I can or cannot do. I won't cancel because I don't play with people, I don't go from one day to the other and suddenly don't have interest in someone, you decided we were over and now, fun fact Robin, now I've learnt to accept it. Three weeks ago, I might've gone out with you on a date, but now? This feels like a joke, Robin. You only want me because you don't want anyone else to have me, not because you truly want to be with me and in a week, you won't want me again. You're playing me like if I was some toy and I'm not!”

“Cormoran, I changed my mind! I wasn't playing you, I'm sorry for the rejection, for all I said, for all I did, for Joe, for every fucking thing, I know I fucked-up, but I am not lying and I'm not playing you, I swear I love you,” she could feel her eyes full of tears. Strike looked so pissed-off. “Look... if she's really what you want, I won't stand in the middle. I want you to be happy, with whoever will make you... but Cormoran,” Robin looked pleadingly at him. “Please don't think so low of me to say those things. And please, whatever you decide, let it be what you truly want.”

“You have no idea what it is like to give up on the woman you love,” Strike retorted. “It's the hardest thing and... I won't throw that effort away just because you changed your mind all of the sudden. I'm not going back, Robin. I just want to forget us and go on with my life okay? I want a new start, I want to be with someone who is always sure of how much she wants me, and whatever this is,” he pointed the air between them, “it gives me more stress and anxiety than anything good. And that's the last thing my disease needs. Coco's a fresh start and I will take it. You could lie to me time and time again to make me feel you didn't want me and congrats, that's how I feel, but I've accepted it, I don't need to go back to your games.”

He walked past her and left the office. Robin sank on her knees and cried, hard, like she hadn't done since they had first separated.

. . .

That night, Robin slept on Strike's sofa, because the children were still there and it was still the holidays so they were still sharing turns. She knew Strike would be fucking Coco at Coco's house or at an hotel, now that he could afford one, so she didn't expect for him to appear around. She woke up the first one in the house, and very early went to the kitchen and sat on a stool drinking tea and contemplating how had she fuck-up so badly. She understood how Strike might be feeling. He associated her with the pain of rejection, of someone who doesn't seem to know what she wants, and was looking for a fresh start, for something better, safe. For someone who truly wanted him, someone who wasn't going to change opinions and have his heart at stake every five seconds.

She heard the door open so very quietly, and heard Strike's cautious but clearly _his_ steps, as he walked to his bedroom trying not to awake anyone. She bit her lip, knowing his night had been great. She couldn't blame him. He had waited her for over a year, thinking she'd come back, she'd want him back... and now he felt lied and betrayed because she had made him think she didn't want him, and now he had no remedy but to move on from her, not wanting to have anything to do with someone who had caused him such negative feelings. Coco was a burlesque dancer. She was party-goer, fun, knew how to fit in anywhere, everybody liked her... she was a break for him. She made his world easier, like Robin hadn't been able to do.

To her surprise, after an hour, when it wasn't even six yet, Strike appeared, showered and dressed with new clothes for the day. His lips still looked over-used.

“Morning,” Strike said, moving around her to prepare breakfast for everyone.

“How's your lung doing?” Robin asked casually.

“Impressively well,” he replied, nonchalant. “Listen, uh...” he left the tea mugs he had been holding on the counter and faced her. “I'm sorry about last night. I got too angry too fast, won't happen again.”

“It's fine. You had your reasons.”

“Still... Look, our children are my priority, they're getting used to us being separated, Aiden's forgetting the time in which we were together, she was so young then... so this will be okay for them. Once you feel ready, I encourage you to date other people and frankly... I hope Coco and I stick together. I think we need to start thinking of our individual happiness, Robin, because the kids do notice when we're miserable. Lucy's father was a gentleman to my Mum and still is to me, to this day, so third-partners are often great ideas, you know? You've got the experience to have one hell of a relationship now.”

“Don't act as if you wouldn't care if I started dating.”

“Of course I'd care, but I wouldn't stop you and I would only care for so long. Robin... before anything else we're best friends and work partners, let's not play with that, okay? Let's protect that to death. For us, and for our children.” She nodded.

“'Course.”

“So is everything all right between us?”

“No,” Robin shrugged. “You wanted honesty, no more lies, right? That's honesty. But we'll keep going, and I promise to stay in my best behaviour with you and Coco. I hope she makes you happy. I truly do.” Strike nodded.

“All right,” Strike said. “I've actually been thinking a lot and... why don't we take separate holidays this summer?” Robin scowled, looking at him.

“What? Separate?”

“Look I don't like it anymore than you do, but our children would assimilate we're not together more easily if we weren't together all the time. They're going to grow-up thinking we're some sort of dysfunctional family. I just think that if they got used to being with us without the other around it wouldn't be so weird for them, nor so tough.”

“They're without one of us every week.”

“Not really. We work seven hours a day Robin, and they're always with us at the office, what we have now is basically nights only. They're used to seeing both of us daily, and then when one of us goes for whatever reason or isn't there for dinner or whatever, there's drama. I'm sick of Aiden crying 'cause you're not around many nights when I put her in bed, you know? Asking if you will pick her up from school every time I get her there because she doesn't understand it's my turn with her and not yours, and that means you're not around. If we could just actually have times without the other around for a week or two, then they would understand what being separated means.”

“It would break their hearts!”

“It's what we chose when we separated, Robin,” Strike said sternly. “Last news Robin, being separated actually means being separated. If we don't do this, Robin, when our new partners start wanting us to spend the festivities at theirs, our children will be completely heartbroken and lost and confused because it has never happened before for them that one of the parents isn't around for a special occasion. We need to slowly warm them up and get them used to it, so that when we have separate lives with someone else it's not such a shock to them.”

Robin knew he was right. For over a year, they had lived in a world in which they were separated-but-not-really for the sake of their children, and they were always confused, always wondering what it really meant, and yes, often asking where Strike was that he wasn't home for dinner or something. They had been removing the bandage so slowly that it only hurt more, and if they could just rip it off once and for all they would have a chance to get used. They should do small periods of separation at first, in preparation for longer ones.

“Fine,” Robin said turning around and sitting down again. “I'll take them to Masham one week of the summer, you take them to St. Mawes another week, we'll see each other again in London.”

“Great.”

“Do you also want me to give you this flat's key back?”

“Not yet,” Strike replied, busy with breakfast and not looking at her. “You know, in case of emergency.”

Robin closed her eyes and clenched her jaw. She didn't want to cry anymore.

“I want us back together,” she murmured, sounding like a child pleading to her parents.

“I told you I'd agree with you, but I don't even know who you are anymore, Robin. A year of lies, you outdid yourself. I can't even keep count of how many times you told me you didn't want me, that we were better apart... well... I don't want to be with a liar, with someone who jumped into another man's arms just to try to forget me. You broke my heart. I won't risk it getting hurt by you again. Sorry.”

Strike left the kitchen, and Robin's lip quivered. She wasn't used to him being so cold, so angry, so serious and distant. He had always been loving with her, but now he seemed decided not to be so much ever again.

  
  



End file.
